Better Than Cake
by L's lollipop
Summary: She was beautiful, she was crazy, she was sweet, she was so amazingly smart. What wasn't to love? But she was just an experiment. Or that's what L told himself. Mild crack and AU. Crime, angst, uber fluff. LxOC big surprises later.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Hello!! Welcome to my first ever fan-fic! This is actually the second edition of chapter 1. I something I really needed to change, and I think the grammar is just slightly better. I really LOVE getting reviews! I have so far written up to chapter 7, and I'm really busy but I will try to write chapter 8 soon! Oh yes, to my fellow Light and Misa haters, they're not in here! Yeah!! This story does NOT have "action" in it, nor will it build up quickly. I wanted to write a cute story, and I actually started writing only for fun, without the intention of uploading it, but a friend of mine said it was really (hmmm…) and that I should upload it. I really don't think it's that good; there are a lot of things about it that I'm not happy about. But I'm still having a blast writing!

I noticed at one point that this story does indicate in anyway when it is supposed to take place with relation to the Kira case. Although it does matter in the slightest to the story, I would like to imagine that the story takes place after a sort of "alternative" ending to the Kira case, in which Kira is defeated by L, and everything is perfect… if anyone is reading this who has not finished Death Note, don't worry! Death Note has a great ending, so don't worry, too much. Anyway! Enjoy! And please please please (please) review! Don't be shy! And I don't mind criticism, as long as it is constructive, and not just rude.

Love you guys!

L's Lollipop

Chapter 1

"Here you are, sir", said the smiling woman behind the counter, handing L a huge portion of cake.

"Thank you very much", replied L, he handed her his money, then walked, hunched over slightly, and head hanging, towards a large and comfortable looking chair by the wall. He stepped with one foot onto the chair, then turned around and crouched down on the chair so that he just sat on his butt, his feet flat on the chair. He slid slightly down the chair and raised his feet slightly, kicking off his shoes; he replaced his feet on the chair and began rubbing his toes against his feet and the chair. He took his fork in his hand, holding it rather strangely, with just his pointer finger and thumb, and dangling it around much more than would seem necessary. He stabbed a one of many extra strawberries he had requested on top of his nearly half a vanilla cake, with extra frosting.

"Wow!" came a happy voice from somewhere just beyond L's line of sight.

He turned his head, normally a voice wouldn't have held his attention for more than a split second, but he had been bored, he was in between cases (for once) so he didn't have anything better to do than wander to his favorite cake shop, which was about 5 minutes by foot from the Hotel he was staying in, in Edinburgh, Scotland.

The source of the voice turned out to be a girl, she was happily staring at her own half cake sized portion. L was slightly surprised that anyone else ordered cake portions that big, but it wasn't that much of a shock, she probably had a friend coming to help her eat it, or 3.

The girl paid for her cake (marzipan centered vanilla with piles of strawberries and what looked like a whole chocolate bar grated on the top, L noticed, his interested almost captured) over to a small table, (no room for friends to sit with her, L noticed) and climbed onto her chair (in almost the exact same way that L was sitting, except she splayed her knees out slightly and sat more firmly on her bottom, while reaching in between her outwards bending knees to reach her cake, L noticed, his interested captured and held firm), she then reached into her large black bag which hung from her shoulder and pulled out; an iPhone, an iPod, two books, one of them a large volume called "A History of Mayan and Incan Religious Ceremonies", and a manga called "The Black Rose", which had a very dark looking cover depicting a girl with long, waist length black hair, dark blue eyes and who was holding a human skull with the eyes still in it.

The girl plugged a set of headphones into both the iPhone and the iPod, then listened to a song on the iPod while pushing buttons on the iPhone, "hi!" she said brightly into the phone when the person on the other end picked up, "no, nothing really, just eating, cake", she said, in response to whatever it was that the person she was talking to had said. "NO! I will not get fat!... I dunno, I just cant… really? Wooooow, tell me about it!" she listened intently to whatever it was they were saying, at the same time listening to the iPod, and then balancing the big book upright and beginning to read while holding the manga in the other hand. Her head swayed in between the two books, she seemed to be reading them simultaneously.

L watched her in utter fascination; his cake even was abandoned on the table.

The girl was sitting with her back to him so he couldn't see her face, but she herself was dressed in a long black skirt, slightly torn, with a black shirt which a high collar, this covered in lace. Her hair was long and of a brownish color, but it had natural high lights, which caused it, appear different colors as she moved her head.

The girl was talking into the phone again, "that is awesome! Well, it looks like you guys are really making some progress! I'm jealous…"

She giggled, to L it sounded like quite a brain dead giggle, but from observing her and her ability to multi-task, he couldn't think that she wasn't, at the very least, extremely intelligent.

"hon," she said into her phone, "I really gotta go, this cake is just calling to me. No I don't think my cake is more important than your love life! But this cake is soooo fresh; I have to eat it now! Yeah, yeah, call me later, okeey, yeah I love you to!"

she hung up, L suddenly noticed that he was on his feet, he had a strange sensation, which he was sure he had never felt before, I sort of tingling, which went all the way through his skinny body, like when even he had had too much coffee and sugar and began to get gittery, a seldom occurrence, but never the less one which happened.

L couldn't help himself, almost before he knew it; he was walking over to the girl in the chair.

The girl was replacing the phone in her bad, "air head", she muttered, "oh well, she's sweet, so I don't mind".

L caught that, even though she said it quietly, and found himself very confused, why would she be apparent friends with someone that she considered to be of low intelligence?

L reached her and she looked up, taking the head phones off her head as she did.

"can I help you?" she asked, smiling at him. L realized it was practically the first time a female of his own age, and probable intelligence had ever smiled at him, it was a bit disturbing to him…

"I noticed the title of your book", said L finally, for once he really had nothing to say, although he didn't really talk much, he always said what he thought, and he always knew what to say, if not exactly when to say it. For once, he simply wanted to talk, but there was nothing he could of, he had just met, seen, this girl, and knew absolutely nothing about her.

"oh! You mean this one?" replied the girl, completely non-phased by the strange looking and behaving man standing in front of her, she held up the manga, "yeah! Its really good, my friend wrote it! He based the girl on the cover on me, but shes way prettier, and my hair isn't that color." She crinkled up her eyes at him, smiling again.

L looked closely, the girl did in fact have dark blue eyes, not quite as vivid as the girl on the manga, but hers were so big and bright that he had been able to see them from about 3 tables away.

"Well, actually said L, I meant the other one," he pointed at the large text book, "its an area of interest to me". "Really?" asked the girl sounding very cheerful to hear that. "Oh yeah! Where are my manners, I'm Taiyo", she held out a hand to L, "it means Ocean in Japanese, my favorite non-archaic language!" L reached out his hand, and tried to decide which alias to use, he eventually just decided on his favorite "please call me Ryuzaki", he said, and shook her hand.

_Ok ok!! I'm thoroughly annoyed! TAIYO DOES MEAN OCEAN!! But yes, Taiyo also means sun, and there is a reason for this. In ancient Japanese mythology, the sun was believed to literally "come out of the ocean". Because of this, they thought of them as the same thing, so, they are both called Taiyo. Although, because of the tones in Japanese, they are pronounced differently! So please, BEFORE making an idiot of yourself, either read this, or get a freaking dictionary!! I'm very sorry for all my yelling, but I'm just absolutely driven mad by all the reviews that only say that Taiyo's name is wrong. _

_Thanks very much for reading! And please review!! Just not to whine about Taiyo's name, un. _


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 1

_So… as I said on the last chapter, I really will upload this, not that I expect anyone to read it! I have a few friends who said that they wanted to read this, that's the main reason I'm uploading it, makes it easier for them. But if anyone else happens to take an interest, please review! As I also said, I'm new to writing and I really would appreciate any suggestions! Oh, yes, there wont even be any kissing until the next chapter, and it probably wont get beyond that. Sorry everyone! I just hate writing sex scenes… I've so far written up to chapter 7 in 2 days. Yeah! Ok, I'll shut up, hope you enjoy! _

Chapter 2

"Sit down?" said Taiyo, pointing at the table; "I can drag over an extra chair". L was surprised to find himself very pleased that she had asked him to sit down.

L nodded, "I would be happy to", he answered Taiyo's request. But, perhaps your table is too small for two people, my table is slightly bigger, and the chair is most comfortable".

Taiyo gave him a curious, searching look, still smiling happily, L felt chills run through his body, he had never really look at him that way. Taiyo, was certainly a very unusual girl, even by L's standards.

Taiyo and L walked to his L, L grabbed the arm chair from the table right next to his and set it about half way around the table.

They both climbed oddly onto their chairs, people around the café were starting to stare at them.

L peered at Taiyo, he had never been afraid to stare at people, but he honestly had never really thought of his staring as intrusive and couldn't understand why people did not like hold his gaze for very long.

Taiyo seemed to have no problem with it however and looked right back at him, still smiling in a completely unconcerned way.

Taiyo took an enormous bite of cake, then, with her mouth still full, she asked L, "tho you thaid that you wer intwerestwed in dis book", she held up "A History of Mayan and Incan Religious Ceremonies".

"I am", said L, though in all honestly, it was never a subject that he had the faintest interest in. he of course, knew a fair amount about the subject, although he had never studied it with any passion.

The two began to converse about the ancient races of Central America. For about 30 minutes, they talked happily, the whole time they talked, L felt more and more confused, anyone who had any experience in the matter would have been able to tell L that he falling head over heals for Taiyo, but L had never had romantic feelings towards _anyone _and had always thought of love as something completely unnecessary, something for dumb people. Taiyo, although L had no idea of it, was feeling quite taken with the strange man, the one who had simply showed up at her table saying he had noticed her book.

L found Taiyo to be, as he had guessed, much more than extremely intelligent, she had interesting opinions and was very knowledgeable.

After quite a bit longer, it was dark out and Taiyo looked at her watch. "oh shoot!" she said, its getting really late, I need to be getting home". L looked at both of their plates of cake, L had long since finished his, and Taiyo had left a very much smaller portion on her plate than had originally been there.

"are you going to eat that?" he asked her, pointing at the cake.

Taiyo giggled, "no, I'm not, I'm totally full". "may I have it then?" asked L. Taiyo's face brightened, "of course!" she told him, pushing the small piece of cake at him. L quickly gobbled down the cake. Taiyo looked at him with a very big smile on her face. "you aren't afraid to be yourself, are you?" she asked. L felt confused again, he had probably felt confused more on this day than on anything other day of life.

"What do you mean?" he asked. "I mean", said Taiyo, "that not many people would ask for someone that they had barely met's left over cake". She nodded succinctly.

"Would you like me to walk you back to your home?" asked L. "its getting dark, someone who is very physically attractive like you should not walk by themselves, its quite dangerous". Taiyo beamed at him. "Did you just call me pretty?!" L blinked, he had no meant it as a compliment, but since Taiyo seemed happy that he had said it, and she seemed to think he had been complimenting her, he told her that he had. Taiyo suddenly swooped in, closing the around 2 feet in between them, and giving L a kiss on the cheek.

L rubbed the spot on his cheek, staring open mouthed at Taiyo, who was grinning at him like she hadn't done anything out the ordinary.

"I'd love it if you walked me home!!" she told him, "but you know," she laughed, "we've been talking for about 5 hours now, so neither of us has had dinner, we could go to a restaurant instead, or I could cook, I'm actually pretty good!"

L blinked at her for a very drawn out pause, finally he gather a few words together, "do you have _romantically _inclinedfeelings towards me?" he half croaked. Taiyo blinked, then laughed again, "I don't know about that" she said, though she privately knew that she did, "I will admit though, you are really cute!" she beamed at L again, who blinked, staring in open mouthed amazement. _No girl _had EVER called him cute, even as a joke.

"my palate, is a bit, unusual", L told Taiyo who laughed again, "don't worry!" she told him, "mine is too, but based on your level of cake consumption, which seems to surpass even mine, something my acquaintances thought was quite impossible, I think I can guess at a place you would like". She laughed again, hopped to her feet, then grabbed L's arm and pulled him up to. L felt shocked, Taiyo felt so completely comfortable around him, which was entirely different from anyone else that L had ever encountered.

"Ready to leave?" Taiyo asked him, while looping her arm through his.

L wondered if this was what "dating" was like, he couldn't have known it, but the front of perfect calm and self assuredness that Taiyo was projecting wasn't at all how she really felt, she had the worst butterflies she had ever experienced, usually all she had to do was stand there, and guys would be falling all over her, Taiyo might have been quite gothic in a lot of ways, but she was very beautiful, and she had a natural charm which people usually could not help but be attracted to. L had noticed all this too, and was wondering why this really beautiful woman seemed to find his company, at the very least, enjoyable.

L's self esteem sky rocketed, and although he usually walked about hunched backed and with his head hanging down, he walked just slightly more upright, and with his head held higher than normal.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 1

_Wooo hoo! Here the plot really picks up! My dad says I will never finish this… that means I will for sure! Must prove dad wrong…. _

Chapter 3

"Where are we going?" L asked Taiyo, after they had left the café and were walking down the street, Taiyo with her arm still linked through L's very skinny arm.

"My place!" said Taiyo brightly, its really close. L noticed for the first time that Taiyo did not have a proper Scottish accent, they had been speaking in English all the while, and although L looked rather Asian, and he had grown up until he was 8 and was taken in by Watari, in Japan, and speaking Japanese, he did not truly have an accent.

"Might I ask where your original place of birth is?" L asked Taiyo.

Taiyo blinked at him, "could you tell by my accent?" she asked, sounding surprised, then she grinned, "well, I guess I should be surprised, you seem really smart, I guess it makes sense that you'd notice something like that, but most people don't notice. Since you ask, you'd be right, I'm not from Scotland, well lets see, I was born in America, then I moved all over the world until I turned 17, then I settled here by myself, but I've been traveling a lot since then to. By the way, your name sounds Japanese, is it?"

L nodded, "then do you speak Japanese?" asked Taiyo, sounding excited. "I do", L told her.

Taiyo instantly switched into Japanese, L was amazed, her Japanese was very good, and there was barely a trace of an accent.

"So", she asked in Japanese, "what would Ryuzaki-chan like for dinner, Taiyo is a good cook, I specialize in deserts because cake is my favorite food, my cakes aren't nearly as good as the ones in that café we just went to, but Taiyo likes them anyway! But for normal food, before desert, what would Ryuzaki-chan like to eat?"

L blinked, chan? She had called him chan, he was sure it wasn't just a grammatical error, her Japanese was far to good for that, but in that case, well, he hadn't met anyone like her before.

L answered Taiyo in Japanese "Ryuzaki doesn't know what kinds of foods Taiyo-chan is best at cooking, Ryuzaki doesn't normally eat foods that aren't deserts, but I would like to try Taiyo's cooking. Does Taiyo-chan have a specialty?"

"Taiyo does have one! Its Taiyo's secret recipe for beef teriyaki, extra sweet!"

L wasn't sure if he would like that, thought it couldn't hurt to try it. "I would be very happy if you would cook that", he told Taiyo.

Taiyo beamed at him "you really are sweet". She told him, "I wish all guys could be as polite as you are, and you haven't even asked me yet if I'm single, its kind of refreshing". She sighed, "most guys well, you know, actually", she giggled and poked L's arm gently, "maybe you don't, you don't strike me as the type who has much experience with girls". L's pale skin actually flushed, most people would never have seen it, but Taiyo noticed it right away, even if she didn't mention it.

Taiyo and L reached a corner and he looked at her expectantly, Taiyo took a long a drawn out breath of the calm but misty night air.

"Would you mind if we didn't go straight to my house?" she asked, switching back to English, "it's a beautiful night, I would love to walk around a bit more".

If L had been thinking a bit more clearly, it would have occurred to him that he had not bothered to check his cell phone for the whole time he had been out, he had it set to the lowest possible vibrate setting, and he hadn't noticed it going off all the times it had because his attention was riveted on Taiyo.

L was actually fairly tall, about 5'10, but walking as he normally did, with his back bent and head hanging, very few people noticed this. Tonight, L was walking much more upright than he usually did. Taiyo was fairly tall for a woman, but not greatly so, she was about 5'7, so she was at just the right height that if L looked directly to his left and down a few inches, he was looking at the top of her head, and he couldn't help but stare transfixed at how her hair shimmered as she turned it, looking around at the night time world.

"I certainly wouldn't mind walking around a while longer," said L, he didn't have to leave Taiyo, and was that he didn't want to, although because he was so ignorant about everything to do with girls, or romance, he still hadn't figured out the scientific reason for his wishing to stay in Taiyo's company.

Taiyo smiled her very happy smile and tugged on L's arm, dragging him across the street and into a park, which was actually more like a small and dense forest, which had a large lake in the center.

"I love to come here at night", Taiyo told L, "but I've never brought anyone with me before". She looked up at L, the moon was out, and it reflected in her eyes, making them appear more blue and luminous than ever before.

Suddenly, something clicked for L, he remember that, many, many years ago, while he was still living in Wammy's house, he had been browsing the library for a book to read, when he had stumbled across a romance novel, he hadn't really understood what it was, but after reading the back cover and still finding himself confused, he decided to read it, that of course, took him only about 30 minutes. L remembered reading about how the male character had been standing with the female character in the book, in a very similar situation as the one he was in now. Remembering what the character had then done, L decided to try it. It would be an interesting experiment, or he thought at the time, having no idea what he was getting himself in for.

With his free hand, L reached out an held Taiyo's chin gently with his pointer finger and thumb, just as he held everything else, slowly, he tilted her head up and kissed her.

Taiyo's eyes widened for a split second before she dis-entangled her arm from L's and wrapped both her arms around his neck, before closing her eyes. L was taken aback by this reaction, but decided to follow suit, and he wrapped both his arms around Taiyo's waist.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 1

_Wow! Someone is actually reading this! Shock… anyway, I'm really busy with tons of tests, so the story may take a little break. But I'm already working on chapter 7, so I hope people wont run out of reading before I can keep it going. please review! _

Chapter 4

Taiyo opener her eyes first, pulling out of the kiss, she smiled at L, but it wasn't her usually full of exuberant energy smile. It was calm, and L almost thought that it looked just a bit sad. "I cant believe this", she whispered at last, looking straight into L's black eyes, "I mean, I've just met you, I don't know a thing about you, but I just cant help but trust you completely. That was your first kiss though, wasn't it?"

L blinked, and flushed slightly, how had she known? Was he really that bad? "I-I'm sorry", he finally stammered, "you-you are correct, I've never kissed anyone before".

Taiyo stared straight into L's eyes for a while, "that must have been lonely", she said after a pause.

That take on the matter was one L had never thought of before, he had never thought of himself as lonely, he had Watari, and his cakes, and his cases. Watari was a good and caring Father, but it was true that he was just about the only person L had had any real closeness or felt any trust in. L did feel as though his life had been turned upside down by Taiyo, and now that he was beginning to understand his feelings for her, he began to grow afraid, the reason L had always rejected friendship was because he was always afraid that his friends would be hurt, L had so many enemies, and if he had people he needed to worry about, well, it would just complicate L's life, make it harder for him to do his job, solve cases, and always remain emotionally detached.

But he hadn't been able to push Taiyo away, and now… "it will only be harder", he thought to himself.

Taiyo seemed to be guessing what L was thinking in the few seconds in which he remained silent, "I know", she said quietly, "you've rejected people all your life, and now that you've let someone in, you're afraid, aren't you? You must have a good reason, to give out aliases, to continually deny yourself emotions, or friendship. I cant pretend to understand your reasons, but it makes me very sad". A single tear fell out of her eye, a slid down her cheek, her tear appeared to be made of molten silver to L, because of the way it caught the moon's light.

L suddenly realized he did not want to see Taiyo crying, as gently as he could, he brushed the tear off her face. It was amazing to L that he was able to behave in this way, a day ago, he would never have believed it possible.

Taiyo removed her arms from around L's neck, L had even forgotten they were there, and wrapped her arms around L's waist instead. She turned her head so her face was buried in L's shirt.

"its ok", Taiyo told L, "I'll understand if you have to leave". L felt at an utter loss, he had no idea how to react, was Taiyo telling him to go? L somehow didn't think, he did know however, that he didn't want to leave just yet; he would like to remain in Taiyo's presence at least until his "experiment" (he was still trying to delude himself that that was all this was! Despite simultaneously knowing that he had strong feelings for Taiyo) was over with and he had drawn conclusions about he had other people reacted and behaved during relationship like situations.

"if you want me to leave, I will", L told Taiyo, "but I personally have no desire to leave".

Taiyo looked up from L's shirt, "really?" she asked.

L smiled, he very rarely smiled but when he did, his whole face was transformed, he usually looked like a young and happy child when he smiled, L had always said that he was childish, and his face when he smiled reflected just that. A slow smile broke over Taiyo's face as well. She threw her arms around L's neck once more and kissed him again. L hadn't been expecting that and was knocked off balance, L was lucky, he had studied Capoiera and was able to spin on the ball off foot in time to avoid being completely knocked over, Taiyo on the other hand, did something completely amazing, when she realized that they were going to fall over, she released L and tucked her knees into her chest while still in mid-air, then she extended them once more, and would have landed perfectly, except that she had the bad luck to land in a patch of slippery mud, she slipped, and would have landed on the ground if L hadn't caught her.

"Ow!" she said, then looked around her, "oh," she again, "I'm not on the ground", she saw L holding her up, bent over at an awkward angle, "oh" she repeated, "you caught me, thank you. Now, ready to try that again?"

Before L had a chance to ask what she meant, Taiyo launched herself upwards, tackling L yet again. L still wasn't ready for her, and this time, was completely knocked onto the ground, this didn't matter very much because he had bent over so far to catch Taiyo that he already quite close to the ground, Taiyo somehow managed to control her fall, she landed right on top of L, but not very hard, and L was surprised at how little it hurt.

Taiyo kissed L yet again, less hesitantly than when he had kissed her, it was still a very sweet kiss, but slightly harder and with more fervor behind it. L had no idea how to respond to this, but to try his very best to kiss back. L was also surprised at how heavy Taiyo really was, but L found himself not minding, she felt very solid and real, even if she was actually quite small and skinny.

Taiyo finally rolled off of L, she lay on her back, next to him on the ground, with her hands lying on her chest, and she was staring in wonder at the moon, which L believed was the day before full moon. She rolled onto her side an began to play with L's ebony colored hair, "this feels unreal", she finally told him, "are you real? Or am I just having a dream? This is probably just a dream really, life is never this good to anyone".

L felt confused again, and a little bit hurt, "I'm quite real" he told her "what would make you think that I'm not?" he peered at her through his bangs, a similar thought had been plaguing him all during the time he had spent with Taiyo, this was, to L, a day from someone else's life, someone weak, someone like the people he had always tried so hard not to be like. L no longer thought he cared, today was today, tomorrow he would return to his normal life, a sudden pang hit him, this pang was also something he was new to, at least under these circumstances, he had only ever felt this way about cake, the one thing he knew he couldn't be without. L's eyes widened, was Taiyo like cake? He wondered, peering at her in the same way he would peer at a strawberry or fascinating piece of evidence.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 1

_And here it is folks, chapter 5! I really must get writing again, but tests… you know how it is. I thought I should mention this, I noticed about half way through writing chapter 4, that Taiyo is VERY similar to me. Gulp… I think I mentioned that when I uploaded chapter 1… but I thought that since it was about at this point in the story that I noticed, I should mention it again here. I guess I'm not shocked that I would base L's girl friend on myself, subconsciously. Well enjoy, and don't hate me for not being able to come with an original female character… being madly in love with L myself makes it difficult. _

Chapter 5

Taiyo sighed again and, removing her fingers from L's hair, she crossed her arms behind her head and looked up at the moon again. L sat up clumsily, he hugged his knees into his chest as he normally did, and sat on the grass, looking shyly side ways at Taiyo. Something suddenly clicked in his mind; he was horrified that he hadn't thought of it sooner, Taiyo had said that she was sure that he must have a good reason to give out false names. L's mind raced, how had she known?! It was impossible… for her to have known. "Taiyo" said L, "how did you know that Ryuzaki is not my real name?" "mmm?" said Taiyo, turning her head sideways and blinking cutely in a very ignorant way. "oh, that", she finally said, seeming to have finally figured out what he meant. "Well, I thought it was obvious, it shouldn't take anyone that long to think of their real name, and it took you at least 2 seconds to reply. I thought it was obvious, if you didn't want me to know you were lying, you need to improve your acting, or at least narrow your list of false names". She smiled very cutely at L, "but like I said earlier, I'm sure you have a good reason, so I won't pry".

L nodded, Taiyo had yet again done something, which no one had ever done to him before. Taiyo's cell phone began to ring, it was obviously a custom ring tone, L thought, and a person's ring tone was a good way to judge their personalities. Taiyo's phone played a fast but really quite beautiful song, L couldn't make out the words though, but although he had never had a great deal of interest in music, the song didn't bother him, and it did remind him of Taiyo.

"Ah!" Taiyo half-yelled, "I thought I had turned that bugger off!"

Taiyo reached into her bag and pulled out the cell phone, she pressed the off button and the music stopped abruptly.

It hit L like a train would that he had checked his phone, or told Watari where he was, or that he was even still alive. L jumped to his feet, Taiyo looked up, then looked back down, "leaving after all?" she asked. L had not meant to make it appear that way, he wasn't sure how to tell her that he needed to call his foster Father, in order to tell him to call off the international search for L that was probably underway as he had lain on the grass.

"I need to call someone", L told her, sounding slightly mechanical, not that that was anything terribly strange for him, he was used to not having to use many words to convey his meanings, and, as talking interfered with thinking, he had no wish to do it more than necessary. But now, he wanted to make Taiyo believe him, he would be right back, he wanted to come back. But L, not able to find the right words, simply squatted back down and patted Taiyo awkwardly on the head, "I will be back", he said, then stood up and walked back into the trees, making sure he was out of ear shot of Taiyo.

L dialed Watari's number and waiting, he didn't have to wait long. "L!!" Watari's voice nearly screamed out of the mouthpiece. "Do you know how worried I've been? Do you know how many times I called you? Where are you? What happened? Are you injured?" L's eyes widened, but had _never _seen Watari display any kind of emotional response, certainly nothing near this level before. But then again, L had never been out of where he was staying for anywhere near this long without communicating with Watari first.

"I am perfectly fine", L told Watari, "I am not injured, I have merely met someone and I was distracted from calling you". "Very well, are you coming back now, L?" asked Watari, he must have noticed that L had not answered his question about where he was, but he seemed to have decided to ignore it, it was L's business. "I will not be returning just yet", answered L, "I wish to remain with the person I have met for a while longer, I do not know when I will return, but if it is not within 4 hours, assume that something has happened to me, if I do not call you and inform you otherwise first". "L", said Watari's voice, "may I ask who it is that you have met?" L thought about this, he was not surprised that Watari had asked that question; he was probably thinking that there was always the slightest chance that the person L had met had ill intentions. L finally decided it was all right for Watari to know about Taiyo. "It is a female", he said at last, "I believe we may be beginning a-a romantic relationship?" he finished, sounding almost as if he was asking Watari if it was really true. "I'm sorry?" replied Watari, thinking he must have mis-heard L, "a romantic relationship", repeated L. there was a long, drawn out pause on the other end of the phone, "very well", repeated Watari, "but be sure to be careful". "I will," promised L, and he hung up.

Taiyo sat on the grass, she too hugged her knees into her chest, and she folded her arms across her knees and laid her head to one side on her folded hands. "Is this, is he real?" she whispered.

L walked softly back to where he had left Taiyo, she wasn't where she had been lying, and at first L's heart skipped a beat, which confused him, until he finally found her.

She was sitting on a small, wooden dock, which jutted out over the lake, she had pulled up her long skirt so that it was around her thighs, she had very pale legs, and, in the bright full light, they appeared almost to glow. She was leaning back on her hands, with her head tilted back and her eyes closed, her feet dangled off the end of dock so that they floated just beneath the surface of the water.

Despite how quietly L was walking, she still heard him and she looked around. "You are back!" she said, with a look of pure joy on her face.

L removed his shoes and sat down beside her on the dock. He sat as he normally did, with his knees pulled into his chest. He had to admit that he didn't have to faintest clue about what to say to Taiyo, she seemed to always have something to say, so waited for her to ask him something. Sure enough, when Taiyo realized that L didn't know how respond, she nudged him gently in the shoulder with her head. "dinner now?" she asked. L nodded again, "that would be fine with me", he told her. Most people probably would have found L's reaction to their offering to cook him dinner, to be fairly rude, Taiyo did not however, instead, she stood up laughing, " I know" she said, "how about a before dinner swim?" she said, pointing at the lake.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 1

_I've had way too many tests!! So my writing has slowed down a great deal. I'm sorry… _

_Well, I've been getting a LOT of reviews which only seem to serve the purpose of being very rude and pointing out that I "miss translated Taiyo's name". I am PERFECTLY AWARE that I did. Although it may sound strange, I did it on purpose. Taiyo means __ocean __not __water__, I know. I did in fact initially miss translate water, so my apologies, but I quickly decided to leave it that way, (I decided BEFORE I uploaded) because it works well with the whole story. Please don't spam my inbox anymore by telling me that I'm an idiot or similar because I miss translated! Oh and another thing, TAIYO IS NOT SCOTTISH! I'm assuming people will have figured that out, if they have read to chapter 6, but I wanted to reinforce the point. I will now shut up, ENJOY! And sorry for yelling… _

_Oh yes, one more thing, I got (I mean this) about 90 minutes of sleep last night. (I think I'm turning to L) and I wrote most of this then, so I'm guessing there will be more errors than normal. _

Chapter 6

L looked at the lake, swim in it? "Do you know if it's sanitary?" he asked Taiyo. "oooooh yes!" she replied, "actually they just cleaned it out two days ago, its artificial so they can drain it, scoop out the gunk, and it's all clean!" she began to remove her all skirt. L looked away quickly, trying to be modest, Taiyo laughed again, "its ok! You can look!"

"No, its n-" he began, but never got finished. "Turn around, silly!" said Taiyo, she took his shoulders and firmly but gently turned him around. She had removed the skirt and the shirt, but she wasn't naked, she wasn't even in her underwear, underneath the dress she must have been wearing some kind of shorts, they were tight fitting, but not very much so, and under her shirt she must have had on a sort of undershirt, because she was now wearing one. Taiyo's eyes widened slightly "oh, but what about you? What will you swim in?" L didn't remember having agreed to go swimming, but Taiyo seemed to want very much to go swimming, and it did somehow sound interesting, if not entertaining, as he had never gone swimming in anything other than a hotel pool before.

"I am a male", said L, "you are a female, therefore my modesty is not at stake, and so I can swim in my underwear". Taiyo giggled yet again, "ok with me", she said. L removed his shirt and jeans, while Taiyo stared silently out at the lake from where she stood at the edge of the dock. When L was standing in his boxers (plain black and fairly loosely cut) he joined Taiyo at the tip of the dock. "old fashioned aren't we?" said Taiyo, commenting on the fact that L was wearing nothing but his underwear but he had not wished to embarrass Taiyo by seeing her in hers. "Thank you", Taiyo told him, "that's a nice quality in a lot of ways, most guys would jump at the chance…" she gave L's hand a light squeeze.

"Well, don't wait for me, cause I wont wait for you!" chirped Taiyo, with that she leapt high into the air, and with a perfect dive, she slipped into the water.

L entered the water much more hesitantly, he sat on the dock, the lowered himself carefully into the water, to his surprise, it was quite warm, and it had a clean, sandy bottom. Taiyo popped out of the water, she was nearly in the middle of the lake, which was saying something since the lake was roughly circular and it had a diameter of about 40 yards, L was again impressed with Taiyo, she had just swum about 15 yards and she did not seem to be especially out of breath. She began to swim slowly back towards L.

Contrary to his appearance, L was actually quite a good swimmer as well, and he swam easily towards Taiyo. When they got with about one yard of each other, Taiyo stopped swimming, "you can touch the bottom here", she told L, its actually quite shallow until you get right into the middle. L looked at her, wondering how she knew the geographic of the lake so well. Taiyo seemed to correctly read his thoughts. She laughed, blushing a little, "I swim in this lake all the time, I've never been caught either". She looked brooding for a moment, "its kind of incredible though, I just met you, what, 8 hours ago? There are friends that I've known for years and I've never taken them to this lake, or swimming. I guess there is something…. different about you, but I don't know what that could be…" her voice trailed off, then suddenly she burst out laughing.

She dived under the water, L submerged himself to, he could see that she was doing all sorts of little tricks under the water, L suddenly caught himself thinking the strangest thought, he wished he could be spontaneous and free, like Taiyo was being. She did something strange under the water, it was like spinning, but she rotated her whole body, from the waist, it created a small whirlpool above her head. She dove all the way to the bottom of the lake, then swam very quickly back to the surface and shot out of the water.

Every time her head was out of the water, she would laugh again. It was amazing to L to see anyone so full of happiness. Taiyo suddenly noticed that L had been standing in the same place, just watching her.

She swam over, "I'm sorry!" she told him, "come with me", she reached under the water and took hold of his hand, L blinked, but Taiyo simply pulled on his arm slightly then began to swim towards the middle of the lake, L easily swam with her, keeping pace. When they had reached the middle, Taiyo momentarily dropped L's hand and rolled onto her back. "Float on your back", she told him. L, confused, obliged and rolled onto his back, L was so skinny however that he had to kick his feet to keep from sinking. Taiyo picked up L's hand again and began to kick her feet to. L kicked also and they were swimming along their backs, staring at the night sky. Taiyo had a look on her face which suggested that she was at utter peace, "its my favorite moon phase tonight", she informed L.

L looked at the moon, but he couldn't see anything particularly special about a one day before full, moon.

"May I ask why?" L asked Taiyo.

Taiyo took a deep breath, "because", she said, and her voice sounded rather hesitant, "when it still isn't full moon, its like there's still hope, that full moon wont happen, and we will be able to wait for it, forever".

This explanation at first made no sense to L, but as he thought about it, he began to be able to understand Taiyo's explanation.

They swam very, very slowly across the lake, swimming only fast enough to keep them afloat, Taiyo still had her fingers entwined in L's, and L was surprised to find that he did not mind at all.

They finally approached the shore and Taiyo put her feet down, touching the bottom. L put his feet down too, the lakebed on this side was also sandy and clean, and he happily squished sand between his toes for a moment.

Taiyo suddenly gasped. L looked at her in surprise "is something wrong?"

"no, nothing at all!" she told him, "what time is it?" L looked at his watch, it was waterproof so he had left it on. "Its 11:57", told Taiyo. Taiyo began to draw lines and figures in the air in front on of her. She inhaled sharply. "I think something really amazing is going to happen, lets get out". She climbed out of water onto the bank of the lake which was opposite from the dock where they had gotten in. this bank was much steeper, more like a small hill, with a slope of about 70. She reached her hand out and helped to pull L from the water, even though he didn't need the help. She led to a point about 1/3 of the way up the hill, then sat down.

L sat down next to her, wondering what was about to happen.

"I don't know the exact time, but if the moon reached its zenith at 11:13, then it should be soon", Taiyo told L, but she said it half to herself.

L continued to wait patiently, he felt like he wanted to make some gesture to Taiyo that he like her and was happy that she seemed like him in return. It was very strange and unaccustomed feeling to L, he had never felt anything in particular about any one person, and now that he had someone he wanted to be friends, and perhaps more, with, he was at a complete loss about how he should convey his thoughts. He nibbled on his thumb nail as he always did when he was thinking hard, he eventually chose to do what he thought was honest and sincere. Very hesitantly, he reached out his hand and placed his finger tips on Taiyo's hand, where it lay on the grass. Taiyo looked momentarily surprised, then she smiled, and she nodded her head. She reached over yet again, and poked L.

"Are you still attempting to prove or disprove my existence?" L asked her.

"Yeah" said Taiyo, looking a little sad, "I guess this sort of thing has never happened to me. I'm a bit, well, a bit in shock. Actually though, I really doubt that this happens to anyone, but its hard for me to believe that I just met you, only a few hours ago! I already feel like I know you so well. Its frightening…"

L nodded, he agreed with what Taiyo had just said, but he knew he could never phrase it that well, or add anything to it. Taiyo smiled at him however, seeming to understand what his nod meant.

Taiyo shivered, "its cold", she complained, "and we're all wet, but that's my fault", she giggled.

"I would give you my jacket, but as I don't have one, I cannot", L told Taiyo.

Taiyo smiled, very softly, "well", she said "I'm cold, mind if I just snuggle?"

L wasn't sure she meant, but before he could ask, Taiyo, scooted closer to him and leaned on him. "Much better" she said, rubbing her arms.

L wasn't sure why it was true, but he felt happy that Taiyo was leaning on him. He reached out, very hesitantly, and rubbed her arms too.

"Thanks" said Taiyo, and she wiggled herself into a more comfortable position on L's skinny arm.

Then suddenly, it started to happen, the moon, which was now a few degrees past its zenith, reached a point in the sky so that it's light hit the lake just perfectly so that it turned the entire surface of the lake white, and cast reflections of the lake onto the surrounding banks of the lake, it was most pronounced where L and Taiyo sat because of the steepness of the their patch of bank. The reflections rippled and swayed across their faces, Taiyo's face light up, not just because of the reflections upon it, she seemed to be completely consumed with delight and the white watery reflections.

She sighed again, but it was a sigh full of happiness, "this can only happen 3 times a month", she told L, "its another thing I've never shown anyone else".


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 1

_At long last it is here! Ok, it wasn't really that long, just a few days, but I've been busy as a 'hem' bee! There is some MAJOR plot changes at the end of this chapter, it took me a lot of thinking and kicking myself to make this plot change, I did not want to for personal reasons, but I think it will be very good for the story. Oh yes, I wanted to promise people NOW this story won't have a sad ending! I promise!! And if anyone figures out the little thing at the end, please don't spoil it! Arigato minna! _

Chapter 7

L glanced at his watch. It was getting very late, nearly 12:30. He still had a while before he needed to call Watari, and he found himself drawn somehow to the shimmering reflections.

Taiyo was still laying on him arm, L smiled a little, looking at her hair, which was still dripping onto him. The moon was shining on Taiyo's hair, making it show different colors even more than usual.

L leaned over and rested his head on top of Taiyo's. she closed her eyes and nuzzled her head further under his. L's confidence in his ability not to make Taiyo not like him was growing, he (still rather hesitantly), stopped rubbing her arms, and instead hugged her, still rather loosely, but great progress for L.

Taiyo suddenly started giggling again, without warning, she put one of her hands onto L's chest and pushed, not hard, but hard enough to send the skinny detective toppling onto his back.

L blinked in surprise, but Taiyo merely kept laughing and then flopped down too. She rested her head on the place where L's shoulder connected to his chest, then she looked back up at the sky and fell silent.

L was beginning to feel yet another strange and unfamiliar sensation. He suddenly realized what it was, he sleepy! L tried to blink anyway the tiredness, but felt his eyelids moving firmly downwards. There was something incredibly soothing about Taiyo's weight on his shoulder.

L knew it would not be a good idea to fall asleep in the middle of Edinburgh, and especially not in the middle of the night. He looked down at Taiyo, her eyes were closed, and her breathing had slowed, L guessed, correctly that she had fallen asleep.

L reached down and patted her cheek lightly, "Taiyo", he said, "please wake up, you should not fall asleep here, you will become sick".

Taiyo merely mumbled something incoherent, buried further into L's shoulder, and threw one arm across his stomach.

L decided that Taiyo was probably not going to wake up, so feeling very thankful that he was stronger than he looked, L stood up and picked up Taiyo. He carried her around the edge of the lake and set her down near their abandoned clothes.

Taiyo must be a very sound sleeper, L thought as he tried to put her over shirt on her while she was still asleep, it was very difficult, but he managed it. He was quite sure that he wouldn't be able to get her skirt back on, so he compromised by wrapping that around her wet hair before getting all of his clothes back on. It was very cold, and L's teeth were chattering, he was surprised that Taiyo didn't seem to be colder than she was.

A new problem presented itself to L, how was he going to get Taiyo home? He didn't actually know where she lived, so he couldn't have Watari drop her off. He tried, yet again, to wake Taiyo, with no success; he couldn't bring himself to try very hard though, she looked very lovely when she was asleep, and not like she wanted to be awoken.

L finally settled on What seemed to be the only solution. He reached into his pocket, pulled out the cell phone, and called Watari.

"Watari" he said, when the older man had picked up, "I am going to have to take my friend back to our hotel room, at least until I can find out her place of residence, you see, she has fallen asleep, and I cannot wake her up".

L could hear the confusion in Watari's voice when he replied "if you tell me her name, I can find out where she lives".

It dawned on L that he did not know what Taiyo's last name was, or even if Taiyo was her real name.

"I'm afraid I do not know her full name", L told Watari. L could tell Watari was rather taken aback, but he did not make any comment, instead he asked, "should I pick the both of you up then? And where are you?"

L gave him instructions on how to reach the lake where he and Taiyo were, then hung up and waited. He was still worried that Taiyo would get hypothermic, or even sick, she looked quite cold, her lips were turning a very light shade of blue.

L compulsively looked around; when positive that no one was watching, although he already knew no one was, he hugged Taiyo as tightly as he could, trying to keep her warm.

Taiyo's eyes opened a sliver, she smiled, although L couldn't see her face, he hugged her more tightly still, he felt determined to protect Taiyo.

L had always thought of himself as the embodiment of justice, but his sense of protecting people was a very general feeling, he did not believe that individual lives were of the most vital importance, he believed that if a life must be sacrificed to save many, it was quite acceptable. But L had never wanted to protect anyone, or any number of people, as much as he wanted to simply keep Taiyo warm.

If L had reflected upon why, he would have realized that the reason he felt so drawn to Taiyo, and without any logical explanation, was all because of how nice she had been to him. She hadn't treated him as a freak, or creep, which was the usual treatment L received, especially from pretty girls.

L pulled out his cell phone again, and called Watari.

Watari answered quickly, as usual, "yes, Ryuzaki?" he asked.

"Watari", said L, "how much longer do you estimate it will take you to reach my location? And do you think you could please hurry?"

"I believe it will take me approximately ten more minutes, Ryuzaki, and I will attempt to arrive sooner, but as I am already traveling 20 miles over the posted speed limit, it may be difficult".

"Thank you", said L, and he hung up.

Ten minutes seemed like a very long time, he wondered where Watari was coming from, their hotel was only a few minutes walk from the lake, but it was likely that Watari had gone somewhere when he thought that L was missing.

L moved Taiyo off of his shoulder so he could examine her face again, the blue was spreading, a little, but fairly slowly, L felt nervous, ten minutes was a long time, but he wasn't worried that Taiyo could suffer any serious ill effects from that much more time, one thing that did worry him however, was that Taiyo was still sleeping, L did not think it was normal for people to fall asleep when cold, at least not until they reached very severe levels of chill, at which point they felt extremely exhausted.

Taiyo was certainly not that cold, but still, she slept on, a contented smile still on her face, L leaned slightly closer to her, wondering if she was dreaming.

L thought of one, rather desperate way to get her to wake up, very slowly, he lifted Taiyo up again, and gave her a very small, light kiss.

Taiyo's eyes snapped open. "Oh" she said, still sounding faintly tired, as L quickly withdrew his face, hoping he hadn't over stepped his bounds.

"Fell asleep did I?" Taiyo asked L, "brrr…", she rubbed her arms, "still cold out here isn't it? Maybe we should get back in the lake, I don't think I remembered to tell you this earlier, but the reason the water is so warm is because, well, Edinburgh has kinda old pipes, and they aren't very well insulated. Quite a few of the hot water pipes run right under this lake, actually a really surprisingly large number of the city's hot water pipes run under the lake, it keeps the lake water really warm, I tested it once, the water was about 85 degrees, hotter than a swimming pool…" her head nodded again, then jerked back up. "We'd probably be warmer if we got back in, ok with you?"

L instantly felt very stupid indeed, he had been so preoccupied with keeping Taiyo warm; he had forgotten about how warm the lake was. They had only gotten cold when they got out after all. "Yes", he said, "I'm worried you could becoming hypothermic, your lips are turning blue".

"Well, lets go then, and aren't you cold? You got cold before I got cold didn't you?

L suddenly realized that he was freezing, it simply hadn't occurred to him.

Taiyo and L quickly took off all of their over garments and jumped back into the lake.

L felt instantly warm, he hadn't wondered before about the lake's source of heat, but he felt thankful for it now.

"I know!" Taiyo called, she had already swum a ways into the lake, "lets have a race! First one to make it to the other side wins. Ok?"

L blinked again, race? As in a test of which one of them could swim fastest? He couldn't understand the logic of it, but he didn't think it could hurt, and exorcise was a good way to reestablish body heat; perhaps that was what Taiyo had in mind.

"Yes, that would be fine", L told Taiyo, who laughed, and joined L at the bank. "Ready?" she asked, when L nodded, she yelled "go!" and leapt forward into the water, L was a good swimmer, but he didn't seem to have quite the 'passion' for it, which Taiyo obviously had. She cut through the water, doing a nearly perfect breaststroke, except that she was keeping her head out of the water as she swam. This was a good idea, L thought, she was still laughing as she swam, as though she wasn't thinking about racing only the actual swimming. Taiyo reached the far bank only a few seconds before L did, almost as soon as they were both touching the bank she called "and back!" and took off swimming for the dock. She was swimming in the exact same way as before, head out of the water, and laughing, laughing, until she misjudged a breath and ended up with a mouth full of water.

L stopped swimming immediately. "Are you alright?" he asked Taiyo. Taiyo responded by coughing a huge amount of water out of her mouth, and spraying it all over, including on L.

"Oh no! I'm sorry!" Taiyo cried, once she had expelled the water. "It is quite alright" L told Taiyo, he didn't see why she apologizing for something she had no control over.

L still didn't know it, but Taiyo's insides were still squirming like snakes, she had a bad habit of coming on too strong when she first met anyone, she could see that L was shy, and had no experience with girls, which made her worry that she might intimidate him. Taiyo felt very drawn to L, he was one of the most interesting people she had ever met, and it took a lot to keep Taiyo interested, she was patient and nice, and didn't see herself as better for being smarter, none of her friends were nearly as smart as her, and she contented herself with thinking only of their good qualities, but still, she couldn't have an interesting conversation with anyone of them, and although she had given up, thinking she wouldn't meet someone who she could have an intellectual conversation with, and who was also not vain and conceited for their intelligence, it had always been something she had hoped to find in someone. And now L fitted her wish perfectly, so it terrified her that she could mess everything up, and loose him.

L felt the same way, although he wasn't as good at recognizing his feelings, and certainly could never hope to verbalize them, he was also very scared of messing up, and somehow causing Taiyo to leave. Even though L had been around some of the world's best minds for almost his entire life, Taiyo was fascinating to him, like how finding a pearl in its shell would be infinitely more exciting than seeing it already out of its shell. Taiyo was different to any other person of high intelligence that L had ever met. Although L had seen first hand, and was proof of the theory that with genius comes strangeness, Taiyo was a whole new twist on the phrase. She didn't seem to compete for recognition of her intelligence, that was something L had never experienced before, Mello and Near were almost never _not_ fighting, and it was all because they competed to see who would replace L.

Something suddenly occurred to L, "Taiyo", he said suddenly, Taiyo looked around suddenly. She had been starring at the moon, which had already begun to descend, although it was difficult to tell if you did not know a fair amount about astronomy. The shimmering reflects had long since faded, and Taiyo's face looked rather longing, as though she missed them.

"Taiyo", L repeated, as Taiyo was still looking a bit distracted, "I had forgotten to tell you, but when I was worried about how cold you were, I called my… assistant, to come and pick us up, he should be here very soon, I thought you should be for-warned".

Taiyo gave L a rather incredulous look, "you were really that worried about me?" she asked L.

L nodded. A few minutes later Watari arrived, L and Taiyo walked over, Taiyo had put her skirt back on after they had gotten out of the lake for the second time, and L introduced Taiyo. Watari inclined his head politely, although he looked a little tiny bit amused, but only L noticed it. Taiyo grinned at Watari in her usual way when he shook her hand.

Taiyo tugged on L's sleeve and pulled him out of hear shot of Watari. "Ryuzaki", she said, "can I get your phone number? I only just realized that I don't have it yet". She blushed just fainting enough for L see, but he didn't comment on it.

"Of course you may have my number", he told her, "and may I have yours?" Taiyo beamed again and they exchanged numbers.

"You are still wet, could I drive you back to your residence?" L asked Taiyo.

Taiyo giggled, "of course!"

They walked back to the car, got in and Watari drove away. Neither of them noticed the pair of red eyes that watched them from just behind the tree, nor did they hear the laugh, which accompanied the hungry stare. "kahhahahah".

_Oh me oh my! Who could it be…? Kahahahah, well, keep reading and find out! And review please! I'm really enjoying the reviews I have been getting, or all but two anyway! _


	8. Chapter 8

Well here it is folks

_Well here it is folks! Chapter 8… yeah… just kidding! I've gotten some really really sweet reviews since I last uploaded a chapter, thank you so much to all the nice people who took the time to leave the nice comments! Please guys, review! I don't demand them to be nice, constructive criticism is totally appreciated as well! This chapter is utter fluff, absolutely nothing important happens in it, I just really felt like writing it for the sake of cuteness. I hope there aren't any rat-phobic people reading, just to warn Taiyo has two rats. To me, rats are the definition of uber cute and pocket sized (my way of saying cute) but I know there are some people with pretty bad phobias… their loss. I'm extraordinarily busy with school, so it could be a while before the next chapter goes up. It will probably also be a long one… oh yes, if there are people reading this who have not read the novel of Death Note (the Los Angelous BB Murder Cases) they may not understand what is going to happen next, my apologies. Every everyone! And please review! _

Chapter 8

Watari pulled up in front of the building, which Taiyo had directed him to drive to. It was an apartment building, quite plain looking, with a plaster front, brown painted, and 6 stories. Taiyo grinned in a slightly embarrassed way, "I know, its pretty dumb looking, I know", she told L, half laughing, half looking sheepish. L, being extremely rich, even if he didn't act like it, had never been inside of a normal house, accept as crime scenes, and that somewhat ruined their atmosphere. L found himself very curious about what the inside of Taiyo's house would look like, but he thought it would be rude to ask. Taiyo opened the door before Watari could get to it, and bounced out of the car.

L got out too, and waited next to the car while Taiyo dived back inside to get her bag.

"Well, Ryuzaki… we didn't manage dinner tonight!" she grinned and did a tiny jig on the side walk, " I guess you'll just have to stop by tomorrow!" Taiyo held up two fingers in a V shape and stuck her tongue out a little, giggling insanely, but really quite cutely.

L nodded at her, "I would enjoy having dinner with you tomorrow night, I will call you".

Taiyo grinned at L, "sounds like a plan to me", she said, then ran inside the building, waving and calling "make sure you call! Jane!"

(Jane is Japanese slang for "see you" or it could be translated as a casual form of good bye, (for the people are really picky about translations…) its pronounced ja-ne. (With short E, for those who do not know how to read Japanese very well…)

As the front door to Taiyo's apartment building clunked shut, L was left standing by the car. L was known for shameless staring, but what he was doing now, was on a rather different level. His head was tipped slightly to one side, his mouth was slightly open, and his eyes were very unfocused.

Watari gave a moment to himself, and his thoughts, before clearing his throat. L blinked, but other than that, he did not respond. "Ryuzaki" called Watari, after waiting patiently, for over a minute but finally deciding that L needed to be brought back to his senses.

After a momentary pause, L's head snapped back into its normal position, and he looked around, appearing slightly confused.

"Yes, Watari?" said L, he seemed to have decided to play dumb, something he wasn't great at, despite his fairly good acting skills, he looked slightly guilty, for some reason, as he peered over his shoulder at Watari.

"I believe we should return to our hotel room now, Ryuzaki, it is very late, I know you do not sleep a great deal, but as you have not had any coffee for more than 8 hours, I would imagine that even you are getting tired".

L's head snapped up, it snapped up because it had been dropping down towards his chest without his being aware of it. L suddenly noticed that he _was _very sleepy, he had noticed at the lake, when Taiyo was sleeping, but he had grown so worried about her that he had completely forgotten his own fatigue. This was also very likely the longest that L had ever gone without coffee, or some other form of sleep dispelling agent. L's mouth fell slightly more open when he realized all this.

Looking even more spaced out than usual, he walked back to the car, and climbed into the back seat as soon as Watari had opened the door. L upon the seat in the same way he usually did, and chewed thoughtfully on his thumbnail. Such an experience had never happened to him before, and it was certainly something, which required some very serious logical thought.

But as it often happens, people who possess unusually high intelligence have a hard time with simple questions, they put too much thought into them, and therefore, cannot see an answer lurking right under their noses.

As Watari pulled away and began to drive back to the hotel L was staying in, L continued to sit and silently think about Taiyo, what had happened between them, and what his next ("logical") step should be. The detective in him told him that Taiyo was a completely pointless distraction, and that she would interfere with his solving cases. However, a side of L which rarely showed itself, told him that there was nothing wrong with spending time with Taiyo, and that (in order to appease the logical half) Taiyo would be an interesting and informative study. L knew somewhere in his consciousness that he would completely go with his more emotional side, and go even beyond what it was now tell him was permissible.

The moment that L was back in his hotel room, he went to the mac laptop on his desk, and looked up the word "love".

"_Love represents a range of human emotions and experiences related to the senses of affection and sexual attraction. The word love can refer to a variety of different feelings, states, and attitudes, ranging from generic pleasure to intense interpersonal attraction. This diversity of meanings, combined with the complexity of the feelings involved, makes love unusually difficult to consistently define, even compared to other emotional states."_

L read no further, he did not need to be the world's greatest detective to know that what wikipedia was basically saying was that they had no idea. This, certainly would be no help to him, with a sigh, he closed the computer. L had no idea how to phrase what he felt for Taiyo, but he knew that this strange description, or lack there of, would not help him word it correctly. L also wondered why love was so indefinable, all things had a definition, he thought, why couldn't they simply phrase the concept of love in a simple, and easy to understand way, L wondered.

"Well", said L to the silent room around, and although there was no one within hearing range, he spoke softly, "perhaps I should try falling in love, then I would be better able to understand it, after all, I don't like loosing, or not knowing things"…

L suddenly noticed what a strange thought that was for him, not only had he never before considered the possibility of himself falling in love, but he didn't know the faintest thing about love, or how to go about the process of falling into it…

L certainly didn't know a thing about the definition of love, but, although he wouldn't figure it out for quite some time, he actually knew a lot more about love than he would ever have guessed he did.

Taiyo closed the door to her room behind herself with a tiny click. She bounded across the room, calling as she went "Tsuki! Kawa! I'm home!" grinning broadly, she skipped over to a large cage which sat on top of a dresser, opening it, she pulled out two rather fat rats and carried one on each hand. She brought them over to her bed and set them down, "Tsuki", she said, addressing the slightly larger of the two, a white rat with a black dot on top of his head, " you are getting fat, if this keeps up, there will be no more peanut better for you…" she said it in a mock serious tone, but fell over giggling just as she managed to get the sentence out. "And you Kawa", she said to the other rat, this one a very pretty shade of blue grey, but slightly darker than most, "I saw those chew marks on my couch, and this is against ratty ordinates!" this too, Taiyo attempted to say in a serious voice, and she shook her finger at Kawa, who sat still on her bed, staring up at her, obviously non-plussed. "Well, guys", said Taiyo finally, after heaving a sigh, "I'm sorry I wasn't home sooner, but well, I kinda met someone and… oh sorry you two, I'm babbling… I'm sure you guys have better things to do". Taiyo flopped down on her bed; Tsuki and Kawa trundled over to her and climbed onto her stomach. "uaw!" cooed Taiyo, and she began petting both of her adorable pets, "you guys sure are sweet, does this mean I can tell you guys about what happened?" When neither rat tried to leave, Taiyo took it as a sign that they were all ratty ears, and immediately launched into a full length explanation of what had happened between her and L, giving very minute details to the rats, who had long ago fallen asleep, but Taiyo, who was looking at the ceiling as she recited, did not notice, nor would she have really cared. She actually knew that the rats were very simple, and however strong their personalities might be, they were not humans, and could not understand her, they were also staying and "listening" because she was petting them, and they were rather fat and lazy, but none of this particularly bothered Taiyo, and she kept talking.

Sometime around 3:00 am, Taiyo's head began to nod again, and she yawned, "well, guys", she said, "I think its time for ratties and humans to go to sleep, its been a long day, after all". She picked up both rats, who largely stayed asleep even as she carried them back to their cage, it wasn't until Taiyo had latched the wire door shut that both rat's eyes snapped open and they immediately climbed up the sides of the cage, and stuck their noses out through the wires. Taiyo noticed and turned back to the cage, "Tsuki, Kawa, you guys have to go to sleep, I'm sorry you two must have been bored today, but, well, I'll try to get Ryuzaki over here to meet you guys, how about that", she wiggled a finger between the wires, then squeaked herself when Tsuki and Kawa began to lick her finger, "that _tickles_!" she said. "Oh right! Let me get you cuties some food, I'll give you guys something a bit special tonight!" Taiyo left the room and came back in a moment later with two teeny trays with diced strawberries mounded on top. She carefully placed both dishes inside, then after making sure each rat was happily eating his portion of strawberry, Taiyo went into the bathroom, got changed and ready for bed. Taiyo skipped back into her room, turned off the light, and jumped into bed. She squirmed under her covers, then curled into a little ball under her blankets before staring up at her ceiling. Taiyo had painted stars onto her ceiling in glow in the dark paint. The stars weren't visible with the light on, but once it was off, her ceiling very closely resembled the real night sky, since Taiyo had been very careful about accurately painting the constellations. Taiyo stared at her ceiling, then closed her eyes, she fell asleep thinking about how tender and hesitant it had felt when Ryuzaki had kissed her. She already missed him.

_Just for the fun of it, Taiyo's rats' names actually have meanings, Tsuki is moon in Japanese, Kawa is River. I just named the rats after two other things I'm obsessed with… _


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 1

_READ PLEASE!! _

_Ok… its been what, like over a month?_

_I feel really lazy… I want to thank my wonderful friend Chantelle for poking me to keep writing, I was in quite a slump, mainly because I did not want to write this chapter. _

_(thanks Chantelle) _

_I have a warning for people, if you want to get the rest of this fanfic, read the death note novel. Or it will make NO SENSE! _

_The title of the novel is the Los Angelous BB Murder Cases._

_Available in most major bookstores, I really recommend it. D_

_Enjoy guys! And please please keep the reviews coming! xD _

Chapter 9

L had gone to "bed" (he had tipped sideways in his chair and fallen asleep) around 2:30 in the morning. He had spent the time after Watari had left him alone, until the time when he dozed off, thinking. L spent most of his time thinking, but this was certainly the first time he had done so with quite so much intensity, about a girl. L was finding himself confused beyond what he thought he was capable of being confused to, over Taiyo's significance and meaning. He had no idea how to handle the whole situation.

Watari never allowed himself to show any emotion, that was not his role, but as soon as his room door was closed, he began to chuckle. Watari had always known this day would come, and he already decided how he should handle it. He was going to leave L to figure it all out for himself, with no help from Watari. Watari was going to allow everything to happen as it would, L was old enough to be able to cope on his own for once. Watari allowed himself a tiny little sanctimonious nod, before going to bed himself.

L finally fell asleep, but as soon as he got up, about three hours later, he ran to find his cell phone and call Taiyo, as soon as he had eaten some cake, although he still didn't know why.

Taiyo's cell phone rang at about 6:00 am. She had been near the point of waking up, as she slept about as much as L, so her voice was only slightly zombie-ish when she answered her cell phone. "Yosh…" she said into the phone, yawning.

L blinked when he heard Taiyo, "I'm sorry?" he said, unsure what Taiyo meant.

"Yosh", repeated Taiyo, with slightly more emphasis this time, "ughhh… who is this?" Taiyo often took a few minutes to wake up, or she at least needed to listen to music before she was awake properly.

"it is Ryuzaki, Taiyo instructed me to you", answered L, still unsure how to proceed with the conversation.

"oooooooh! Ryuzaki! Sorry, I'm still kinda tired, wait no I'm not!" Taiyo had almost instantly snapped into full wakefulness, and she now fidgeted around in a strange, almost dancing like way, which she usually did when in a good mood.

"Taiyo told me that she wanted to have dinner tonight, does Taiyo still want to have dinner?" L asked Taiyo.

Taiyo nodded vigorously, but then apparently remembering that L could not see her, she said, "Yes, of course I do! You still want to come over here?"

"Yes, I would very much like that, and Taiyo is going to cook, correct?"

"Yup yup!" said Taiyo, continuing to jig a little big. "I'll make something sweet, ooh yeah! Remember I said yesterday that I have a specialty dish of beef teriyaki with uber sweet sauce? I could still make that! And umm…. Well, like I said, I'm not too good at making deserts, they always go all flat on me, or way too puffy, I make ok cookies, but they're kinda cheating huh? Sooooo let us see, I could, umm… uh…" Taiyo walked into the kitchen and began to dismantle it, looking for possible deserts. "Oh, I got it! There's an absolutely sublime Gelato place near my house, its teeny tiny so not many people know about it, I'd love to take you their, I think you would really like it!"

L's head was spinning slightly, but he had gotten the gist of it. "I'm looking forward to it, I think it will be fun". He said, still feeling very awkward, and at a complete loss for words. "What time should I try to arrive at your residence?"

Taiyo giggled yet again, mainly at L's choice of words, then said, "well, I get out of work today around 6… so maybe get here around… eeeee… 7:30?" I should have everything ready by then. Sound good, or are you busy then? We could later." Taiyo finished.

"I have no other commitments, I will be at your house at 7:30, would you like me to bring something?"

"eruuuhhhh, no that's ok, I don't think we will need anything else. By the way, do you like animals?"

"Animals? In which context do you mean?"

"Like as pets!" chirped Taiyo, dancing around even more than normal.

"I don't really know…" answered L at last, he had never had much experience with domestic animals, Wammy's house had never had any, and L hadn't really ever tried to interact with any pets like dogs outside of Wammy's house. Once, when he was 10, he had tried to pet a dog, which had not liked him very well, since then L had more or less ignored the existence of pets, as they had very little bearing on his life.

"eeeeahhhhhay! Well, we are going to remedy that! Tonight you can meet my two little friends, Tsuki and Kawa, I'm sure they'll like you, they have good taste in people."

L looked at his cell phone out of the corner of his eye. He had no idea what Taiyo meant, but since he often didn't, it had more or less ceased to bother him.

"Well, I will see Taiyo tonight, and I look forward to eating her dinner", L said into the phone. "by the way, Taiyo, what kind of work do you do?"

Taiyo snickered, mainly at L's obviously dodging of the topic of animals, but also in reflection of her own working life.

"Well… tonight I'm doing to be working at the aquarium, doing some performances with seals, I do stunt swimming with them, but I'm not as good, duh. And tomorrow night… umm… oh right! I'm going to be working with some hard ware developers to make an underwater computer, and the night after that, I'll be training lifeguards. I work different jobs, I don't really have one fixed one yet, I guess settling down isn't really very, me". Taiyo giggled at this odd observation. "But I think if I had to have a career, it would need to be well, a bit odd… and I'd like it if I could travel, and it would need to be mentally challenging! My jobs now, other than working with the seals, just aren't interesting at all… how about you Ryuzaki-chan, what do you do?"

L began to stammer, he certainly could not tell Taiyo the truth, but he thought something even slightly close to it would be good. "I'm a private detective", he said at last.

"Woooooow", said Taiyo, "that actually sounds interesting, is it any fun?"

L considered this, was his role as an "embodiment of justice" 'fun'? He had never asked himself that, he had always thought of it as something he simply "had" to do, something he did not have a say over, it was a job he had always subconsciously thought he, and he alone, could do.

"I suppose so, it is rewarding work, and I do enjoy bringing criminals to justice and it is mentally challenging, so I would consider it to be fun".

"Well ok then", said Taiyo, wiggling a hand in the air. "So I'll see you at 7:30?"

"Yes, Taiyo will see me then".

"Alrighty! See you then, then", Taiyo chirped.

"Yes, good bye, Taiyo," said L, hanging up.

Taiyo put the phone down, and looked around herself, a look of horror dawning on her face. She was standing in the middle of a small sea of dirty cloths, old snack wrappers, now empty tubs of cheap cake, empty ice cream cartons, her equipment for her various jobs, two open suitcases, with stuff spilling out of both of them (still unpacked from last two trips she had had to make because of work) and a large assortment of other various rubbish, old and broken things, and what looked like the entire libraries manga collection.

Taiyo stood with her mouth open, it had very obviously been a very, very long time since anyone had come to her house. Although Taiyo was a very social person, she usually either went out with friends, or went to their houses, and although Taiyo loved all her friends dearly, she didn't have any real connection to any of them, and usually, when she moved, (which was fairly often) she would leave her friend behind without very much notice. Therefore, her house was not set up to entertain company. This hadn't occurred to Taiyo when she had invited Ryuzaki over, but she now saw that she really had her work cut out for her, if she want to embarrass herself a great deal.

The fact was, L wouldn't have in anyway minded the mess; cleanliness and tidiness were not two things that he thought about very much, and the mess would probably have just been another thing of interest to him.

Taiyo however, did not know that about L yet, and she was feeling slightly panicked about doing quite a great deal of what she hated most, cleaning her own house. With a sigh, Taiyo picked up a trash bag, and started on the rubbish.

12 hours, 9 trash bags, and huge amount of laundry, cleaning, and shopping later, not to mention a part time job taken care of, Taiyo stood in her now nearly clean room with a very triumphant look on her face.

"Haza!" cried Taiyo punching a triumphant fist into the air, before capering about waving her hands in the air and singing a kids' song about clean up time. Taiyo bounced over to the rats caged and opened it, Tsuki and Kawa jumped up onto the rim of the doorway and waited to be picked up, looking expectantly at Taiyo. "Yup guys, I'll take you out", she took a rat on each hand and held them at arms length, "look! Its all clean!" Taiyo said with a look on her face of deep personal pride. The rats looked at the room for a moment, then, appearing nervous about falling off of Taiyo's hands, they shuffled along her arms till they were each perched on a shoulder. Taiyo stared thoughtfully at her semi-clean room, then glanced at her wristwatch.

"yeeee-ah! I got to start cooking dinner! Sorry guys," Taiyo told the rats apologetically as she thrust them back into the cage and re-wired the latch. Taiyo skipped into the kitchen and put on an apron which read "present offerings, and the food will not be poisoned".

It took Taiyo about 70 minutes to finish the dinner, so at about 7:20 she finally turned everything off and set the table as fast as she could. Taiyo's table was also quite small, she usually ate out, and when she did cook, she usually ate alone. Taiyo pursed her lips at the tiny table, then shrugged and set the TV/coffee table in the living instead. "Looks like we'll be eating Japanese style", she muttered. She dragged up Japanese tatami cushions (one on either end of the table), and then she set out chopsticks (Taiyo hated forks, she had even tried to eat hamburger with chop sticks) and plates. She then went back to the kitchen, and put the food in the oven to keep it warm until Ryuzaki arrived. Then Taiyo plopped down onto a tatami and waited. At 7:31, Taiyo's doorbell rang; she bounded upwards so fast she made it a few inches into the air, before launching herself at the door.

"Ryuzaki!" she half screamed throwing the door open and standing with her arms flung comically wide, she smiled with her eyes rather crinkled up. When Taiyo opened her eyes a bit more, she saw Ryuzaki standing in her doorway, looking slightly hesitant; he was looking slightly up at Taiyo from beneath his lids. Finally, shuffling his feet, and shifting his weight slightly from one foot to another as he did, he opened his mouth, "g-good evening, Taiyo, I'm happy to see you". Taiyo beamed and hopped forward, then hugged Ryuzaki, but she didn't tackle him; rather she hugged him rather carefully, without any of her usual hyperness. Taiyo let go after a moment, she kissed Ryuzaki lightly on the cheek, and then grabbed his hand tugged him into her apartment.

"I-I, uh…" said L, struggling to get words out. Taiyo turned around and blinked puppy eyes at him, feigning totally innocent oblivion. Ryuzaki finally managed to get his words out. "I brought this for you", he said pulling a rose from behind his back where he had been half-way concealing it, and holding it out to Taiyo, although he was blushing a very dark shade, at least against his pale skin. The rose was a very pretty one, very dark red, nearly black.

"AW!" Taiyo nearly gasped, taking the rose carefully and sticking her nose in it. "Its so pretty! And it smells great too!" L shuffled his feet again, looking with intrigue at one of Taiyo's tatami cushions, "I thought it smelled like you actually", he said, blushing even darker.

Taiyo beamed at him again, and this time she flung her arms around him and kissed him, this time with all of her usual hyperness. Ryuzaki blinked, not expecting it, but he recovered quickly and he placed his hands on the lower part of Taiyo's back and kissed her back, and, although he still returned her kiss with a great deal of hesitance, Taiyo thought that he might have been getting a teeny bit more used to kissing her.

Taiyo finally pulled back, she immediately laughed, L was worried for a moment that she was laughing slight at him, or his horrible kissing skills, but without any comment, she hopped to her away from him and ran over to the large cage in the corner. Opening the door, she pulled out Tsuki and Kawa, and walked back over to L, before plopping down onto the ground and crossing her legs. "sit down", she told L, patting the floor.

L was staring at the two rats, his head to one side, and a look of nearly delighted curiosity on his face. Taiyo's eyes crinkled up again at the look on L's face. She scooted slightly closer to him and tugged on his sleeve, pulled him down next to her. She held out Tsuki, who was slightly more social, although both rats were very sweet. L locked eyes with Tsuki, Tsuki looked innocently back at L. L's whole face was entirely fascinated by the rat, slowly, and very carefully, he reached out one hand, with one long finger extended, and petted Tsuki extremely delicately on the head. Tsuki closed his eyes and seemed to enjoy being petted by L. Taiyo looked delighted by this turn of events. L petted Tsuki slightly more confidently, stroking down his back, Tsuki made quiet whuffling noises, eyes still closed.

"here", said Taiyo, holding the rat out to L, "hold him!" L looked nervous, "are you sure? I am afraid I might drop him". Taiyo grinned, "don't worry about that", she replied, "I doubt you will, and even if you did, we're what, a foot of the ground, he wouldn't get hurt at all… by the way, I forgot to introduce you all, Ryuzaki, meet Tsuki," she held up the white rat, "and kawa," she held up with grey rat. "oi! Tsuki! Wake up, where are you're manners?" Taiyo glared disapprovingly at the rat, who had opened his eyes and who gazed sleepily around himself. L was rather surprised to hear Taiyo talking to a rat, he was fairly sure that Taiyo knew the rats did not speak English. Taiyo held out Tsuki yet again, L took him _very carefully, _he did not want to upset Taiyo by dropping her precious pet, he held Tsuki, not in his normal way, he thought that holding the tiny animal between his fingers would hurt it, but so that Tsuki was sitting in his cupped hands.

Tsuki sniffed L for a moment, and then licked his palm. This tickled L quite a bit, and he nearly jerked his hand back, but caught himself in time. Very quickly, L got used to the tickly licking and he smiled for some reason at the sight of the little animal sitting happily on his hand, licking L likely because he could still smell cake on his hands.

L crossed his legs on the ground next to Taiyo and put Tsuki on his knee. Tsuki sniffed and looked around for a about a minute, then curled himself into a ball and fell asleep. Taiyo smiled with even more happiness as she looked at her sleeping pet. "You know, he really likes you", she told L, "both of these guys are friendly, but I don't know if I've ever seen either of them warm up to anyone quite that fast, maybe they do smell sweets on you". She chortled.

L reached out an petted Tsuki again, the rat twitched an ear, but remained asleep. L found himself feeling happier and happier about how the rat was reacting to him. Taiyo got her feet, "I'm going to get dinner on the table", she told L, "stay there, and hold Kawa for me". She placed the gray rat on L's other knee, Kawa, being slightly more active than Tsuki, climbed up L's t-shirt sleeve before perching on his shoulder and looking around himself.

Taiyo went into the kitchen and washed her hands, then pulled all the food out and began piling it onto plates. L watched her as she moved around the table and in and out of the kitchen, there was something almost enchanting about how Taiyo moved, she was always nearly dancing, and although she was rather clumsy in some ways, because of the near-dancing, she crashed into the door frame twice, but when she wasn't bumping into something, she moved with a flowing kind of gracefulness that was quite wonderful to watch. L continued to watch while Taiyo capered about, until Taiyo finally noticed. Her lip twitched, but she didn't comment.

Taiyo vanished into the kitchen once more and came out carrying the final dish in one hand, and in the other she had a tray with two cups on it. She put both on the table, then went over to L. she reached down and petted both Tsuki and Kawa. Tsuki woke up and she picked them up and put them in their cage. L clambered to his feet, and Taiyo tugged him into the bathroom so they could wash their hands.

When they both had, Taiyo once again steered L, this time to the table. She plucked him down on one side, then, praying he liked her cooking, she plopped down on her own cushion. "ITADAKIMASU!" Taiyo yelled, with her arms out stretched. (Authors note: for those who do not know, itadakimasu is Japanese for, basically, bon appetite)

L looked at the dishes on his plate, he was not sure what most of them were, "could Taiyo explain to me what her dishes are?" he asked. Taiyo paused, poised rather comically in the act of eating something from her chopsticks. She chewed quickly then explained; "this one is the beef teriyaki, I use tons of sugar in the sauce, so its really, really sweet, and then this", she pointed at another dish, "is brussel sprouts covered in caramel, I know it sounds gross, but its really good. This is broccoli with melted chocolate on top. And this here is something I baked, its bread with Japanese red bean flavoring, and its got cake frosting on top". L blinked as the food menu was recited, it certainly sounded fairly gross to him, but he was open to trying Taiyo's cooking, and if it wasn't good, he didn't have to eat it. L picked up one of the brussel sprouts with his chopsticks and examined it critically as he usually looked over everything. L nibbled off a corner of the brussel sprout, he was very surprised, it was delicious. He ate the rest then tried to chocolate broccoli, it too was surprisingly very tasty as well. After L had sampled all the dishes, and found them all to be very yummy, he finally looked up. Taiyo was watching him silently, a look of nervous anticipation on her face.

Taiyo was anxious because Ryuzaki had not made a single comment about the food after he had tried it. Taiyo wasn't sure if he loved it, or if he was eating as fast as he could because he hated it so much. Taiyo had mostly finished eating, and she watched as Ryuzaki ate the last piece of food, a brussel sprout, from his plate.

L met Taiyo's gaze and hastily finished chewing. "Well," asked Taiyo, still looking nervous, "is it good?" "it is extremely delicious, although I am rather surprised, I would not have expected this combination of ingredients to be tasty, but they certainly are. I will have to ask Watari to cook these dishes for me".

Taiyo began to launch herself at L, but noticed the table was in the way, so she crawled off her cushion and over to him so she could tackle hug L from a more accessible angle.

Taiyo proceeded with the tackling, hugging him tightly, and of course, knocking him flat on his back. She squeezed tightly around his neck. "Arigato!" Taiyo practically cheered. After several drawn out seconds, Taiyo stopped squeezing L, rolled off him, and climbed to her feet. She prompted giggled, and she helped L back onto his cushion, and then plopped down next to him on the floor.

Taiyo suddenly felt quite guilty and self-conscious, she had been knocking over Ryuzaki almost continually for the past two days, and she wondered if he had a problem with it.

As a matter of fact, L did not find Taiyo's tackling particularly annoying, he actually found it quite cute, (ahem) "interesting".

L looked over at Taiyo, who was, for once, sitting quietly and watching Kawa and Tsuki in silence.

"Taiyo", said L, touching her arm softly, "I believe we have both finished eating, what would Taiyo like to do now?"

Taiyo tilted her head back and forth slowly, thinking. "Well", said Taiyo sounding thoughtful, I know a great place to go and look at the stars, but its kind of a long drive from here, you up for it?

"How far away is it? I do not wish for Watari to become worried about me yet again."

"Hum…" Taiyo tilted her head back and forth once more, "well, I'm not sure exactly, but I would say about 90 minutes". Taiyo's eyes suddenly sparkled with delight. "Ryuzaki!" she shrieked, "I just remembered! My absolute FAVORITE ice cream place is on the way! We could stop and get some. I'm sure you would LOVE this place. They have got this huge assortment of flavors, and it's soooo goooood! Aahhh.." Taiyo flopped onto her back, and a look of dreamy anticipation on her face.

"That sounds perfectly acceptable to me", L said, after Taiyo had finished talking. It was especially acceptable because of the ice cream, there were few people that L trusted when it came to food, but Taiyo seemed to have excellent taste.

"Well then let us go!" Taiyo chirped, jumping to her feet. She grabbed both their plates, scrapped any left-overs into Tsuki and Kawa's cage, then she grabbed a coat, put it on, then ran back and pulled L to his feet.

"Oh", said Taiyo, a look of concern on her face, "you didn't bring a jacket, did you?"

"No," replied L, "I am afraid I did not, I did not fore-see that I would be out late, or out doors where I would need a jacket."

Taiyo suddenly looked like she was trying her best not crack-up. "I guess you'll have to borrow one of mine then", she said.

"I believe I will be fine", L said, "there is no need for you to loan me a jacket."

"Yes. There. Is." Taiyo said, quite firmly, "if you don't have a coat, you will freeze. Freeze."

"Very well," L said, sulking slightly.

Taiyo ran to her closet and began looking through it.

"Uh oh." L heard Taiyo say, after about half a minute of digging.

Taiyo emerged from the closet with a very sheepish expression on her face. In her hand was another coat. This one, like Taiyo's was a down jacket, but unlike Taiyo's black one, (black, but covered in various adornments) this jacket neon pink, with black zig-zag strips across it. Quite horrible to look at.

Taiyo looked up at L with a very awkward expression on her face. "it's the only other jacket I have that's warm enough. I never wear, but my grandma sent it to me, so I didn't feel like I could just throw it out." Taiyo's face suddenly became more cheerful, "I know!" she said, you can wear my jacket, its not nearly as bad as this one.

Taiyo shrugged off her coat and handed it to L, who put it on, or tried. The jacket was far too big in some place, and far to small in others. Taiyo was shorter than L, and the jacket was rather short on her, on L, it didn't even come down to his belly button.

"Ah", said Taiyo at last. She was wearing the pink and black coat, which was much longer, and bigger in general.

L was going to have to wear the pink coat.

Taiyo took off the coat and handed it to L, looking extremely torn between laughter and crying, and L put on the coat.

Taiyo thought it could have looked worse, L's appearance was fairly effeminate, and if people weren't staring too hard at his chest, he might have been able to pass for a girl with odd fashion taste.

Taiyo grabbed up her iPhone and keys, and, leaving her bag behind, she wrapped her arm through L's, then trotted to the door. Before closing it, she turned, waved to the rats, said, "bye guys, I'll be back soon." then closed the door and locked it.

Taiyo set off with L, and when they got to the sidewalk, she turned left and headed for a teeny smart car, which was parked in a spot intended for a motorcycle.

Taiyo unlocked the car and superciliously held the door open for L, Watari-style.

Taiyo then hopped into the drivers seat, and they drove off. Taiyo headed straight for the edge of the city, they eventually reached a tiny ice cream store. Taiyo jumped out and sped at top speed into the store.

L got too, and shuffled inside as well. L's eyes instantly lit up, Taiyo appeared to be right. Crammed into every corner of the store were different flavors of ice cream, most of them quite unusual. L looked at them, included were; chocolate eggnog, caramel-licorice, lemon sorbet with white chocolate chips, and perhaps 50 other flavors. L looked at all of them, but could not find plain chocolate, or vanilla.

"Ryuzaki!" Taiyo called to L, "Ryuzaki, this is Mr. Pucker," Taiyo gestured at the old man standing behind the counter, "Mr. Pucker, this is my b-, friend, Ryuzaki.

Mr. Pucker, a toothless, rather fat old man, threw Taiyo and devilish, knowing look, before nodding at Ryuzaki.

"One usual please!" Taiyo sang out.

Mr. Pucker scooped out ice cream then handed Taiyo a triple of honey due sorbet, with a strip running through it, of both marzipan and rainbow-mint sorbet. Rainbow sprinkles on top.

Taiyo immediately started slurping it, a look of delight on her face.

"Could I please have 3 scoops of your angel-food-cake flavor, please?" Ryuzaki said to Mr. pucker, "with strawberry syrup on top".

Mr. Pucker handed L his order. L tried the ice cream, his eyes widened in shock; it too, was amazingly good.

"How much?" Taiyo asked Mr. Pucker.

"6.34", replied Mr. Pucker.

"okey dokey", Taiyo replied, reaching into her coat pocket for her wallet.

"Taiyo," said L, "please allow me to pay for the ice cream, I believe etiquette mandates that I do this".

Taiyo cocked an eyebrow at L; Mr. Pucker nodded approvingly at L over Taiyo's head.

"Well, if you want to", Taiyo said at last, shrugging, but smiling at L. "how about I take the ice cream and wait in the car?"

L handed Taiyo his ice cream, and she left. L handed Mr. Pucker money, Mr. Pucker rang up their order, handed L his change and receipt, L thanked him, then turned to leave. His hand was on the door when Mr. Pucker said, "Ryuzaki, you better take good care of Taiyo. I don't know if you've realized yet, but she's an amazing girl and you wont find another one like her for a long time." This greatly confused L, but he nodded to Mr. Pucker and left the shop.

He made for Taiyo's car, but there was no one inside, instead, their ice cream was lying on the ground, beside Taiyo's jacket, and a small patch of blood.

L instantly started to panic, he knew instantly that something bad had happened to Taiyo, and the blood confirmed, hoping desperately that the blood wasn't Taiyo's, he reached into his pocket to get his cell phone and call the police, when the cell phone started to ring.

L looked the caller ID, which read "Taiyo". L flipped the phone open, and cried "Taiyo!" into the phone.

"Hello, L", a voice said out of the phone. "I've got her, you want her back, you are going to have to play my game, your first clue is on her car. Good bye".

"Wait B!" L nearly screamed, just as the line went dead.

_Wheeew! Nearly 11 pages, ouch!! _

_So its out now, for those who didn't figure it out, B is in this story, I didn't want to spoil it. (winks) _

_But if any of you all haven't read the novel, this really, really wont make sense. _

_As a recap, B is like L's evil twin, they look alike, and do a lot of stuff alike. B was the second child raised to be the next L, A killed himself. B's hobbies include: fantasizing about surpassing L, killing people to torment L, and eating jam. _

_Review please!_

_Big surprises coming soon! (winks again) _

_And one thing, please don't over-flame this chapter, I wrote it while very sleepy, getting yelled at to clean, being on post-vacation-stupor, and on no food. _

_Yeha.. _


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

L stared horrified at his phone for only a second. One fact rang clear in his mind, B, his nemesis had Taiyo. This meant that the odds were only about 52 in his favor of getting winning B's "game" and getting Taiyo back. One thing about B was comforting, B never broke his own rules, which meant that until L won or lost the game, Taiyo was safe, after that… L found himself not wanting to think about it.

At once L began to scan the car for the clue that B said he had left. In could be in any form, and anywhere. However, L had only to glance at the car for him to notice that piece of paper held in place under the wind-shied-wiper.

L picked up the paper and read the words written on it.

"_Follow along the direction of her name. The first letter, written by an old fashioned pen, needle-points written in blue ink, the words together form an eagle. Fly with the eagle to find her again." _

L was very confused by the message, but since it was B, that was not surprising in the slightest.

L immediately jumped into Taiyo's car. Taiyo had left the keys on the car seat, so L was able to drive away with any trouble. He went straight to his hotel to inform Watari and get the police involved. He knew it was likely that B would have turned off Taiyo's cell phone, so L couldn't trace it, unless it was part of the game that it was still on, but L could find their last position from the time that B had called him.

--

Taiyo came back to consciousness after having been knocked out, when the cloth was pressed over her mouth, to the feeling of the blindfold wrapped around her face taken off.

She was tied to a chair in a dimly lit, large space. Taiyo's night vision was very good, so she was able to see around herself fairly well. However, there wasn't very much too see, Taiyo could make out the walls around her a little bit, but there wasn't anything else in the room with her. Apart from her captor. He was standing behind Taiyo, so she couldn't see him. Taiyo sniffed, there was a faint smell of decay, and dust, along with chemical smells, Taiyo guessed she was in an abandoned warehouse.

Taiyo wriggled a bit in her chair, whoever her kidnapper was, he was clearly very professional, instead of tying Taiyo's feet, he had bound them so that they were strapped to the underside of the chair, this way, there was no chance of her standing up and using the chair as a weapon. Her hands were securely fastened behind the chair. There was a gag around her mouth, but just as Taiyo was about to scream, she felt the gag being untied.

"Thanks", Taiyo said, to the air in front of her, once the blind fold was removed.

There was a pause, then a voice behind her replied, "you're welcome".

"hum hum", Taiyo mused, "you sound kind of familiar, do I know you? Well, I guess I must, I mean, I don't think people usually get kidnapped by people they've never had any contact with what-so-ever. And I'm guessing you have a reason for kidnapping me, which most likely has something to do with Ryuzaki. I knew he came with a good share of danger, but I wasn't expecting to get kidnapped on only my second day of knowing him, so I wasn't really prepared." Taiyo sighed, "my stupid. Now, I don't suppose that you would mind telling me why you kidnapped me, would you? It would at least help to pass the time. And another thing, do you have my coat? I'm really cold!"

There was a shuffling noise behind her, a sigh, then a large object was wrapped around her.

"Thanks", said Taiyo again, snuggling down into the blanket.

Taiyo's eyes her closed, but she heard the person behind her chair walk around and sit down in front of her. Taiyo lazily opened her eyes, she had been thinking about ways to escape, but it looked like she would have to play cute for her captor for a little while.

Taiyo looked at the man crouched on the floor in front of her, and nearly gasped. The man was a nearly spitting image of Ryuzaki. Although she would never have mistaken the two of them, this man had red eyes, and there was just something else about him, a sinister feeling that Taiyo had never felt around Ryuzaki, there was no denying that, in terms of physical appearance, they were very similar.

Taiyo scrutinized the man crouching before her. Finally she spoke, "wow, you look like Ryuzaki. You two related or something?"

"No, not related", B replied, "but I suppose that you could say that _I am him." _

"Uh… ok then." Taiyo said, raising an eyebrow, but otherwise seeming to accept B's reasoning. "Have you got a name?"

"Please call me Ryuzaki", B replied.

"Wah?! No! I will NOT call you that. Even if you two look a like, I can tell that you and Ryuzaki are as different as cherries and strawberries. I know, I shall call you Gemi." Taiyo decreed B's new nick-name with perfect matter-of-fact-ness.

For the first time, B let an expression cross his face. This girl was very weird; he had already decided that. She seemed to have absolutely no fear of death, or of him.

"Why Gemi?" he asked at last.

"From the constellation Gemini, you know, the twins. I think it suits you, being like Ryuzaki's other half and all that. But Gemini is just too long to say, and Gemi sounds nicer. So, Gemi, why are you keeping me here? And what do you plan on doing with me? And you don't think you could un-tie my feet do you? The way you tied them, which I must congratulate you on, is _really_ uncomfortable! By the way, why are your eyes red?"

B blinked his red eyes in utter shock. He had tied up a lot of people before, and this girl was a first in almost everything she had done. It was almost like she was trying to have a conversation with B, which would also make her the first to ever try to start a conversation with B. B found it almost enjoyable.

"I'm keeping you here in a challenge to L, he needs to play my game to get you back. But since I'm better than him, he will loose the game and never get you back. And I guess since my rules stipulate it, I will have to kill you."

Taiyo's eyebrows shot up, both of them, just before she started to giggle, "L? L?!" she choked out, between the giggles. "I guess I'm done-for then, there's no way that L will start looking for me. I guess you don't know much about L, but he only gets involved in cases where there are more than 10 victims, or more than 1 million dollars at stake."

"L will try to find you… he _loves _you."

Taiyo snorted, "I don't know who you've got me confused with, I've never even met L…" her voice trailed off and something seemed to suddenly snap into place behind her eyes. "B…" she breathed softly, and for the first time, something like fear, like, but not quite, more like anxiety, flashed in her eyes.

The muscles in B's face tightened, "how do you know who I am?" he hissed at Taiyo, who was staring at him with an amazed look on her face.

Taiyo shrugged as well as she could while tied up. Then suddenly she started laughing insanely, she laughed so hard that she nearly tipped her chair over. Tears poured down her face. When the laughter had quieted down, a tiny bit, Taiyo finally choked out, "I-I snogged L, an-and, I didn't even realize it!" With that, Taiyo dissolved back into laughter.

It was B's turn to have an epiphany, "T." he hissed at Taiyo, who nodded, still giggling.

"well, isn't this a great reunion!" Taiyo chirped, wiggling about so her chair danced. "or, well, I've actually never really met either you or L, since I was raised in the American and Japanese branches".

B smirked, "as expected of L's only female heir. If I'd known you were T, I would have taken a lot more precautions. This is most improbable, T and L, fall in love, then B abducts T.

Taiyo rolled her eyes, "yeah. Yeah. Funny isn't it. But we are NOT in love! Wish I could say that was true, but its not. Anyways, its nice, or well… not really, to meet you, B. I can't believe I didn't figure all this out sooner, at Wammy's they always referred to you as "the L gone wrong", I should have known the second I saw you."

"You left Wammy's when you were 15, I believe," B said slowly, "and you came there when you were 9. Why did you leave so soon? More training would have been good for you. And you surrendered all your rights to receiving L's title. Why?"

Taiyo looked rather comically thoughtful for a moment then said, "wow, B, you were first in line to replace L, that would make you really smart, but you cant even figure _that _out?! I left because I didn't want any of that life. I didn't want to be looking over my shoulder for ever more for people trying to kill me. And I moved to Scotland because of 3 little words, _low-crime-rate. _I didn't want to have to be a detective, ever. But I guess people like us have some kind of gravitational attraction to each other." Taiyo banged her head on the back of her chair, seeming to be quite exasperated. "And another thing!" she said heatedly "I made up my mind that I would _never _be anyone's Cinderella, and look where I'm stuck now! Waiting for L to come rescue me. This sucks!!" Taiyo banged her head again. "ow."

Taiyo slide down in her chair a little bit, then grimaced and straightened back up. "hey B", she said, "you don't think you could untie me, do you?" this hurts, a lot. I promise I wont try to run away. And after all, you can watch me, I'm sure you've got a gun, and its not like I've got anywhere to go, or anyway to get there."

B wasn't sure why, but he believed Taiyo when she said she wouldn't run away, and he did have a gun, and if Taiyo was T, then she wasn't stupid. B got to his feet, and untied all of Taiyo's ropes. B had a hard time undoing the knot that bound Taiyo's feet to the chair, he didn't want to crawl under the chair, because once Taiyo's feet were free, she would be able to kick downwards and connect directly with his face, B had just been on the receiving end of Taiyo's kicks, and he had a nasty cut above his eye. (it was his blood that L found on the ground). B eventually crouched behind Taiyo's chair and blindly, and quite awkwardly, untied the knot. B backed quickly away from Taiyo has she tottered to her feet. She was quite unsteady due a lack of blood in her feet.

B sat down on the ground again, and watched Taiyo, thumb in mouth, as she tottered comically about for a while, then she to sat on the ground. They sat in silence for quite a while, then Taiyo finally spoke, "well, this is awkward isn't it?"

B tipped his head to one side, confused by this last comment, there was nothing that they _needed _to talk about, so why should they? Talking to simply pass time? That thought seemed strange to B.

"Well its fine," said Taiyo, "I'm getting tired, so I'm going to bed-I mean sleep now."

Taiyo lay down on one half of her blanket, and threw the other half over herself. She closed her eyes, then promptly opened them again and sat up. "What about you?" she said to B, "don't you need a blanket? I've got this one; do you have another one? Won't you be cold?"

B was finding himself in a similar position to how L had found himself in when he had first met Taiyo. Nearly everything she did confused him. B wondered why on earth would be concerned over whether he had a blanket, when he had just told her flatly that he might have to kill her.

Taiyo, however, continued to patiently watch B, and, when B shook his head, Taiyo held up her blanket and said, "we could share this one, if you think you'll get cold. Its only like 40 degrees out." B was confused, again. What B had really meant was that he didn't need it, he wasn't planning on sleeping, and although he was a bit cold, he could manage just fine, although he was slightly curious about what Taiyo had meant by "share this one".

"I don't need it." B said rather bluntly.

Taiyo shrugged and lay back on her blanket.

B thought she had fallen asleep, until Taiyo said loudly, "I miss my hot water bottle!"

After that, Taiyo really did fall asleep, B sat and watched her for quite some time, she was fascinating to him, in many ways, he couldn't have picked one, but one of the strangest things was the way that she sometimes seemed so innocent and clueless, and at other times, she showed her true genius.

B law down on his side so he could still watch Taiyo, he wasn't sure if she was going to try to escape or not, but he didn't want to take any chances.

--

L sat in his chair, chewing on his thumbnail. The riddle that B had left his was sitting in front of him. B hadn't given him a specific time frame in which he needed to solve the puzzle, L wondered if that meant something as well.

L took a pencil and underlined the first sentence.

"_Follow along the direction of her name."_

L accessed a map of Scotland. From where they were now, in Edinburgh, they were right next to the sea. Taiyo had told him that her name meant "ocean", if the clue was read one way, it could be interpreted to mean that L should go in the direction of the sea. But L thought that wasn't likely, if that was the case, the clue would more likely read "follow to her name", or similar. Instead it suggested that the ocean itself was the source of the direction.

L went back to the computer and researched the ocean as a direction. Nothing came up.

L sat curled in his chair, his hands balled into fists, his head resting on his knees. He thought about Taiyo; and for the first time in his life, L felt panicked, and sad. He felt something hot on his face, and touched his cheek. His hand back wet, and L realized he was crying. Water. That made him think of the time when Taiyo had taken him swimming in the lake, L thought of how Taiyo's hair had looked wet, shining in the moonlight. Water. Suddenly, something snapped into place in L's mind. Something he had learned as a small child, studying various religions in school. L's head snapped up and he began to frantically type on the computer.

_Well, well, well! Taiyo's secret is out! I actually wasn't planning that from the start, but after I started thinking about how smart she was, I got the idea. Hope you guys like it. _

_x-D_

_And yeah, yeah, I know it's a pretty short chapter, but my friend Chantelle wanted to read it sooner, so I just chopped it, chapter 11 should be following soon. _

_I also think there may have been some things sort of… left out. If anyone has any questions, let me know. :-p thanks everyone! And please please review! _

_And oh yes, another big shock coming soon! (just to keep everyone reading..) _**;)**


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 1

Chapter 11

Several hours later, Taiyo was awoken by the sound of whimpering. See looked over at B and saw that he was thrashing about in his sleep.

"No, no! Stop it please!" B whined, seeming to try and ward off something in front of his face with his hand. "Leave me alone! You're dead! I killed you! Go away!"

Taiyo's face instantly turned into a look of concern, she stood up, picked up her blanket, and walked over to B, sitting down beside him.

Taiyo sat down cross-legged next B, then lifted his head and laid it on her lap. Taiyo then threw the blanket over B, and began stroking his hair, humming very softly.

B's thrashing subsided and he burrowed his face into Taiyo's leg. Taiyo smiled faintly and continued smoothing B's hair.

B suddenly awoke. Realizing what was going on, or perhaps not, he lunged at Taiyo, trying to grab her around the neck. Taiyo neatly dodged out of his way, rising up to her knees just behind B and seizing his wrist, holding it in such a way that he couldn't move.

"You don't need to do that", she said, quite calmly, "I was just giving a pillow, and trying to get your nightmares to stop".

B's mouth fell slightly open. 'Does she actually care about me?' B wondered, confused beyond words. 'If so, then why? What did I do to make her like me?' B continued to wonder, increasingly desperately.

Taiyo seemed to guess what B was thinking, "don't get the wrong idea," she said rather coldly, "I'm just trying to be nice to you".

B sat down next to Taiyo and peered at her, much in the same way that L had when he first met her. (Authors Note!! This fan-fic is called BETTER THAN CAKE! _**NOT **_BETTER THAN JAM!!)

--

L had found what he was looking for. Taiyo mean ocean, ocean being water. When L was young, he had studied almost every religion on the planet as a way to get solve cases which involved religious ritual killings. One of the religions that L had to study about was paganism, also known as wickenism. In that religion, each direction was represented by one of the 4 primary elements. Water, represented west. The first line was solved, but if the entire puzzle was this difficult, there was no way to guess how long it would take L to solve it. And also, it had been largely luck that L had managed to work out the first line so quickly.

_The first letter, written by an old pen, needle points written in blue ink, the words together form an eagle. _

To L, these next lines made even less sense than the first. 'the first letter of what?' L wondered, 'likely Taiyo's name', he reasoned, 'but what if it wasn't, it could be the first letter of ocean, or west!' L decided that he would stick with using Taiyo's name, of which the first letter is T, T in lower case formed a cross, if written by hand. L looked at the next phrase, _"written by an old pen"_

L had no idea what to make of this, 'an old pen? How old? And how would the age of the pen affect what was written?' L chewed on his thumb, feeling frustrated with his supreme lack of progress. Although he was used to having to think over cases for hours, or even days or weeks, the fact that B had Taiyo made him very impatient. 'an old pen… what are other names for an old pen?' Quill, seemed the most obvious to L. 'so a quill. A quill writing a low case T. or is the shape of the lower case T what is important? And what is the part about needle-points? Does that mean that the T is only written in dots?

L got a piece of paper and a blue pen. He tried writing a T in dots. (A.N. I wish I could give an illustration of this, but I cant, its word, so please use your imaginations.) L chewed on the pen as he stared hard at his blue-dot-cross. Nothing what so ever was coming to him.

"So", Taiyo said to B, "what were you dreaming about?"

"Why do you want to know?" B glared suspiciously at Taiyo from under his bangs.

"Because, if I know, I might be able to help get them to stop."

"I wasn't having bad dreams. I don't know why you would think that either." B huffily folded his arms and turned his back on Taiyo.

(A.N. goddamn it!! I HATE writing this stuff!! Its horrible, I promise the plot will improve soon, stay with me and put up with this…)

Moments later, B felt a hand touching his shoulder. He turned and saw Taiyo smiling wanly at him.

"You seem determined to get a satisfactory answer out of me", he said, grumpily.

Taiyo nodded, "yes, I don't plan on giving up until you tell me the truth about what you were dreaming. But I did find it interesting how you answered me the first time. I know you're not that bad of a liar, so I think it's rather odd that you would say something that's so obviously a lie. So because you did, it makes me think that you wanted me to know it was a lie. At least at a subconscious level you did. And because of all that, you must have wanted me to keep asking what you dreamed about, because you really want to tell someone."

_Blink. Blink. _B couldn't think of what to do. What Taiyo had just said was quite unnerving to B. he felt like she almost knew him better than he knew himself, which was a very unsettling thought. B had never had a friend, and never confided in anyone.

"I'm still not going to tell you." He said finally, turning around once more.

Taiyo smiled and shrugged behind his back. 'He'll open up eventually', she thought.

--

'What would the significance of blue ink be?' L wondered, still chewing on his pen.

'Could it be that there is a blue-dot-cross somewhere nearby, and it will help me find Taiyo?'

L didn't know what to make of that, so he moved onto the next line.

_the words together form an eagle._

'which words? How do _words _form an eagle?'

L looked again at the blue ink dots on his paper. 'a cross… that almost resembles a bird…' L shook his, trying to clear it, he was now letting his mind wonder, which was something he could _not _allow to happen.

'But there must be some significance of the blue ink…' L experimented with picking the paper up and turning at various angles, but that didn't help in the slightest.

L set the paper down again. The light he was working with shown on the still wet ink, making shine and sparkle. 'looks like water…' L thought. 'water… water!'

"_I'm Taiyo, it means Ocean in Japanese, my favorite non-archaic language!"_

'that must be it! Water is one of the words… but what is the other word? It could be T, but that's not really a word. Letter? No, that doesn't fit the patter, all the phrases lead to some other word. Quill? Yes, that's most likely.'

L wrote the words WATER and QUILL on his paper. Then he tried combining them, recombining them, and then finally rearranging the letters to try and find some reference to an eagle.

(please read in the spongebob squarepants narrator voice. If it so pleases you…)

_30 minutes later… _

L had made no progress. In no combination did the letters or words make up anything remotely like eagle.

L looked at his blue dots… 'eagle, water, quill'. L sighed and started chewing on his thumb, which usually helped him think. When that proved insufficient, he went and got himself a donut.

L held the donut in front of his face and stared at the words the hole in the center. (A.N. yeah!! That's 21.000 words!!)

'Perhaps I need a different form of these words…'

L sighed, he was getting nowhere, and he needed some kind of distraction. L thought about ways to get his mind off the case, which strangely enough usually helped him solve cases. He eventually decided to just turn on the radio, he didn't like music very much, or certainly not what was usually played on the radio, so he wasn't likely to get too overly distracted by it.

L got up and padded across his hotel room to where the radio was, next to his bed. He pushed the on button, it instantly blared into life, playing a truly awful song that L didn't know (or want to know) the name of. The ended and the radio announcer came on.

"_and that was Girl Friend, by Avril Lavigne, here's another song we hope you like". _

L grimaced at the radio, this wasn't helping and this music was worse than he had imagined.

A new song came on, and this one L didn't mind nearly as much. It was rather peppy and upbeat, and it reminded him of Taiyo. The main reason that L liked it though, was that it was all about candy!

L listened to the whole song, smiling rather happily; he was actually enjoying this song.

When the song ended, the announcers voice came back on.

"_that was Lollipop, by Aqua, and here's the next song". _

(A.N. I decided that song was L's official theme song… so I'm so happy I found a good way to work it into the story! Waaahooo! (starts singing))

L turned the radio off. He had an idea, it was rather crazy, but it might just be right. He darted back to the computer and hopped onto the chair. He took his pen again and wrote, _aquaquill._ 'Aquila!! That's the eagle constellation!' L nearly danced around on his chair with glee. "WATARI!!" L dashed out of his hotel room and ran into the next-door one as fast as he could.

"Yes L?" Watari said, very sleepily.

"Watari! I know how to find Taiyo, but I need your help!"

-wipes sweat drop-_ at long last this kami-chan forsaken chapi is OVER!! I think this has to be the second worst piece of foul, stinking, garbage I have EVER written!!_ –bangs head- _so please forgive your rather terrible author… I do promise things will improve. I don't normally say this, but feel free to flame this chapi. I will only agree with you. (well… probably… unless its one of those really pointless flames… those will be return flamed! As usual… ;p) so… the next chapi should be up soon, and I promise I wont try to do much more detective stuff, because I S.U.C.K. at it!!, un! _

_Oiyasumi minna… (goodnight everyone. Cause its uber late!!) _


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

_Beep beep beep_

Taiyo groggily opened her eyes again. "Dun want… wake up". Was the first thing out of her mouth, as she sat up, rubbing her eyes.

Taiyo spent a split second of sleepiness wondering what happened to her bed and pillow, and then remembered about B. she puffed out her cheeks in annoyance, then looked around for the source of the beeping which had rudely awoken her. It was only 6 a.m., according to her watch.

It wasn't especially hard to find, she saw B, who was sitting up to, pushing a button on his own watch, which apparently had an alarm.

"Morning, Gemi", said Taiyo, resuming using B's nickname from the night before.

B glowered at her for a moment, then grudgingly said, "good morning, T."

"Oh yeah, about that, Gemi, please call me Taiyo from now on. I gave up being T a long time ago. I said so last night, I didn't want that life." Taiyo sighed again, "it looks like I shouldn't have bothered giving up that life though, doesn't seem to have made a difference…" she mumbled the last part.

B gave her another strange look, and then fell silent, watching the ground.

When Taiyo was convinced he didn't want to talk to her anymore, she curled into as small of a ball as she could and tried to sleep more.

Around 8 a.m., Taiyo woke up again, B had moved about three inches in the two hours she had been asleep.

Taiyo sat still for a moment, thinking too, she wondered if Ryu- she meant L, would manage to get her out of here, or if he really would even bother. She cared deeply for him, despite how short of a time she had known him, but she felt very unsure about how he really felt towards her.

Then her stomach growled, loudly. "hummm… B?" she half called to him.

He looked up at her. "Yes, Taiyo?"

"I'm hungry. Could we find something to eat please?" Taiyo's eyes widened dramatically, "And you should eat too, it's not healthy to not eat!"

"I suppose you are right. Although I cannot leave you here to find something to eat, and I don't have anything here, so I am afraid you have to go hungry."

"But, you could just take me with you! Then we could both get what we want, you will get to keep an eye on me, and I can get something to eat." Taiyo nodded, seeming satisfied with this solution. "although, do you have any money? 'cause you left my jacket behind, and it had my wallet in it."

(A.N. I'm running out of ways to describe B being surprised by Taiyo's almost-cluelessness!!)

B considered this idea, although it would be greatly easier (AN is that proper grammar?) for Taiyo to escape while they were outside, and she would know where they were, in general her idea would work. B thought for a moment more and came up with a way that he could take Taiyo outside with him.

"Alright. I can take you outside, but only if you will agree to my terms." (AN yeah!! 22,000 words!) (AN yes, I am going to keep doing that, complain if you want… it wont matter, un.)

"okey dokey!" said Taiyo, hoping to her feet.

B frowned slightly. "aren't you even going to ask what they are first? I could say that you would have to…" B tried hard to think of something plausible, then gave up. (he did because your author did too…)

Taiyo shrugged, smiling with amusement at B. "because, Gemi, you aren't an idiot, and you wouldn't make me do anything impractical to you. And since I don't mind being blindfolded or the like, I'm not even going to bother asking."

B had gotten rather used to Taiyo saying unexpected things that this time he didn't even blink or externally look surprised. "I see. Well, I am going to have to blindfold you. And I will keep you chained to myself while we are out."

Taiyo looked concerned for a moment, then a smile spread over her face. The smile quickly turned into laughter, which intensified under Taiyo clutched her stomach, then finally fell over onto the ground from excessive laughing.

For the second time in two days, B stared at a madly laughing Taiyo, with absolutely no idea why on earth she was behaving like that.

Taiyo got her breath back and stood back up, hiccupping and giggling faintly.

"Taiyo? Are you alright? You seem prone to excessive laughter. I do not believe that there is a medical condition with these symptoms, but your laughter to me is very illogical…"

Taiyo nodded, holding her mildly aching sides. "I started laughing because… well, at first, I thought about how it would look to people to see two people handcuffed together. Then I thought about what my friends would say and think if they saw. My guess is that they-they aren't the smartest of people-would probably think I was a total closet pervert… that's why I started laughing."

B might have been an extremely high level genius, but he didn't have a clue about what Taiyo was talking about. He shrugged once more, then also stood up to leave."

--

"You think that you found out how to find Taiyo, L?"

L nodded to Watari, who immediately jumped out of bed and hurried away to get dressed.

L looked back down at his "finished" puzzle and realized there was a problem. There were conflicting clues. One line read; _"Follow along the direction of her name."_

This L had interpreted as "go west", but another line was; "_Fly with the eagle to find her again." _L trotted back to his computer and brought up an online star chart. He examined the constellation Aquila the Eagle. He had been right; the head of the eagle was pointed east, which conflicted with his West clue.

L sat back, biting down hard on his thumb, 'I want cake.' he thought morbidly, then his thoughts went to Taiyo and he had a sudden mental picture of her beaming and waving at him, 'I want her more though…' he thought, feeling much more depressed now.

Watari came back into L's room; he was carrying a tray with coffee, sugar cubes, and just what L had been wanting, (nope! Not Taiyo… sorry…) cake.

L thanked Watari and gobbled down both foods, then asked for more, before he returned his attention fully to the clue.

Watari got the hint that L needed thinking space and didn't press him; instead he just continued to bring in more cake and coffee.

Half and hour later, and L hadn't decided which direction he thought was the right one. Finally, in desperation, he showed the clue to Watari.

Watari set the 5th tray down and carefully read the clue all the way through, then again. Finally he said with perfect confidence, "I believe the correct direction would be west."

"Why do you believe that, Watari?"

"I did help to raise B, as I believe you know." L nodded. "I therefore know how his mind works." L mentally kicked himself. "the clue pointing to west is much more direct. Because of this, he would expect you to choose the other one, thinking that he would mean the less obvious one. Of course, he could have assumed that you would guess that he would planning on you choosing west for that reason, and chosen east instead." (A.N. this method of thinking could go on for quite some time, couldn't it?)

Watari set down the piece of paper, "however, I am not the detective. You are, L. so I leave the decision in your hands."

L impulsively took yet another bite of cake, which calmed him down, a little bit.

"I will listen to what you said, Watari. Could you please go and get the car ready?"

"Right away". Watari bowed slightly and left the room.

L sat in his chair and moped. He thought about the last time he had seen Taiyo, when they had gone out for ice cream, he had had no idea about what could have happened next. The memories from that night came back to him. L cringed slightly when he remembered the horrible jacket, which he had tucked into the bottom of his hotel closet.

L suddenly thought of something, horrified at not having thought of it sooner, he grabbed his cell phone and frantically called Watari, hurriedly explained the dire situation to him, then hung up and called Wedy.

Wedy was still asleep (she had a thing for sleeping in) and sounded quite grumpy when she answered the phone.

As quickly as possible, L explained what he needed her to do. When he was done, there was complete silence from Wedy's end of the line.

"Wedy?" L said uncertainly, wondering if he had been cut off.

"I'm here. And I guess I will help you, but I feel a bit ridiculous doing this…" Wedy sighed, "alright, Bye, L" she said, and then hung up.

(AN yeah!! That's EXACTLY 23,000!! How perfect… now I can go to sleep in peace…)

_sooooo… this is the end of chapi 12! I know I promised drama, and there isn't any, so I'm sorry, I just wasn't feeling terribly inspired tonight. But I did want to get the next chapi up sooner rather than later. And I'm also sorry that its pretty darn short, I'm sleepy, again… there might not be that much important stuff happening in the next chapi either, but I don't know yet. I always rewrite stuff, then recheck it, and then change it (some order like that…) tons of times, so it doesn't stay on plan. _

**NOW REVIEW OR Taiyo IS GOING TO FALL IN LOVE WITH B!! –**giggle**- **ok, I'm kidding, but still, DO!!


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 1

The songs mentioned in the chapi are Broken, by Seether, and All I Need, by Within Temptation. I don't own…

Chapter 13

_I really hope I end up liking this chapi, its my lucky number… _

_And as a warning to my readers, I don't want to scare anymore prematurely, but there is likely to be some BxTaiyo in this chapi. Although I promise the feelings will not be reciprocated by Taiyo!! Well… as long as people keep reviewing anyways! . _

_ALSO!! PLEASE, PLEASE READ THE MESSAGE AT THE BOTTOM!! _

Taiyo watched, or rather felt, as the darkness covered her eyes once more. 'Oh well,' she thought, 'I always did like darkness.'

B finished tying the blindfold around Taiyo's head. Taiyo heard him walk several steps away, to where she was fairly sure the door leading out of the warehouse was, she heard some scraping and banging, then heard B's returning footsteps.

"You may walk now, Taiyo". He said.

"Uh… right." Taiyo took a few hesitant steps in the direction she thought was right. She had a very good sense of direction, but the warehouse she was in was really big, and pretty soon, she didn't have the faintest idea in which way she was going.

"B, help me please?" said Taiyo, waving her hands around, trying to find B.

_Thump_

"Ouch!"

"I'm sorry B!" cried Taiyo! "I didn't mean to hit you. Can you lead me though, please?"

"Umm… alright."

Taiyo felt B hesitantly take hold of the very edge of her sleeve and tug lightly. Taiyo rolled her eyes under the blindfold. "_Geniuses…" _she muttered under her breath.

Taiyo reached out her and grabbed B's. She felt his hand jerk back in surprise, but she held on. "I wont be able to tell where you're leading me if you only hold my sleeve," she said matter-of-factly.

"Oh… alright."

They made it all the way to the door without any major mishaps and no talking. B periodically pulled gently on Taiyo's hand to make her change directions.

Both B and Taiyo were lost in their own thoughts. Taiyo was thinking happy, longing thoughts of what she most wanted to eat. Which happened to be the kind of cake she had when she had first met L.

B started out by thinking about what the next clue for L should say, he was having fun with these clues, and he knew that L would keep playing, because B knew how much L would want to get Taiyo back. 'I can see why he likes her so much. She's very nice… she's even nice to me. I wonder why… it's not like I've been very nice to her…' B mused inside his head. B snuck a glance at Taiyo, he felt odd. He was sure he had never looked at anyone in quite the same way as how he now looked at Taiyo.

'She is different', he decided. 'It is almost like she understands me…' B shook his head slightly. 'What am I thinking? She cannot understand how I think. That is impossible.'

But B still found himself looking sideways at Taiyo, and he realized he was noticing how his eyes were following over the curls of her face, then traveling down to look at her hand in his own.

B realized he liked how Taiyo's hand felt; it was cool, almost cold, but not clammy, not dead feeling. Almost subconsciously, B ran his thumb back and forth over Taiyo's smooth skin.

Taiyo noticed this, but she didn't say anything. Taiyo didn't want to make B feel even more adverse to liking people than he already was by giggling or in other ways making him feel awkward. She did smile faintly however, which fortunately, B did not notice.

They made it through the door and outside, here B let go of Taiyo's hand (he was surprised to find that he almost missed its presence) and went and unlocked the van he had parked outside.

When it came to getting Taiyo into the car, things got a little tricky; the van was rather high up off the ground, so Taiyo had a very difficult time getting herself into it without the help of her eyes. In the end, B had to halfway lift Taiyo up and put her in the car. Taiyo couldn't help it at that point, and she started giggling.

At this point, B had given up on even bothering to ask for reasons for the seemingly random fits of laughter.

Taiyo was privately thinking about the irony of the whole situation, she was getting picked up and put into a car by her kidnapper, and this was her idea.

--

Wedy sighed very loudly as she started to pick the lock on Taiyo's front door. 'this has to be the most demeaning job I have _ever _done for L.' she decided as the lock clicked and she opened the door.

She walked inside and instantly spotted what she was looking for, a large rat cage sat on against one wall. And sure enough, inside, were two fairly large rats.

Wedy suppressed a shudder; she did not like animals at all, especially not rodents, of any kind. Never the less, she completed the mission that L had sent her to do. She got the feed bag out from under the cage, opened the rats cage door, and tipped some of the food onto the floor of the cage. (A.N. MISSION ACCOMPLISED!!)

As she poured food, Tsuki climbed onto the rim of the cage door and sniffed her hands, Wedy cringed slightly, but when Tsuki looked at her in the eyes with small red eyes, Wedy couldn't help but think that he was extremely cute.

(A.N. ok that's over with… I promise it will have something to (although a small part) with what's going to happen next… -)

--

When Taiyo was bundled up into the car, and B had climbed in to, B started the car and they set off for the nearest source of food.

Taiyo tried hard to think of something to talk about, in the end she talked about the first that had popped into her head.

"Ne, Gemi, do you like animals?"

"…"

"Rats are my favorites, I've got two at home. Their names are Tsuki and Kawa, they probably wouldn't like you, but I don't really know. They're pretty outgo-… EEEYYAAAGGGHH!!"

The last interjection caused B to jump so badly that their van nearly swerved into on coming traffic.

Amidst the explosion of honking that ensued, B asked Taiyo, surprising himself a bit, "are you alright, Taiyo?"

"I'm fine!! But I really hope you let me go soon, I need to feed them!

"As I said, I will let you go if L wins my game".

Taiyo waved one hand, "yeah, yeah I know. I just hope he hurries up! If anything happens to Tsuki or Kawa, I might just have to break up with him!!"

--

When they finally reached their destination, which was a small open air market on the outskirts of the far side of Glasgow, B took off Taiyo's blind fold, pulled out a pair of hand cuffs, chained one side to himself and the other to Taiyo's wrist.

Although Taiyo didn't know it, the market they were at was about twice again as far as the warehouse where B usually kept Taiyo.

B tried to help Taiyo out of the van, but she ignored his hand and hopped down easily herself.

Taiyo could practically feel her mouth watering, as she looked at the food stalls in front of her. She sprang forward, yanking B along with her.

B had to jog to keep from getting yanked off his feet again as he tried to keep up with Taiyo.

Taiyo finally stopped in front of a crepe stall. She ordered three crepes and drink, two crepes with ice cream, one with veggies and cheese.

When Taiyo was done ordering she stepped back and calmly let B pay for her food.

People were starting to notice the fact that B and Taiyo were hand cuffed together. Taiyo was wearing short sleeves, which made it especially easy to notice.

Taiyo noticed that passersby were beginning to mutter about "unusual fetishes" and the like.

Taiyo poked B, "people are noticing the hand cuffs".

B turned around, there was in fact a retirement aged couple sitting from them, who were giving them particularly dirty looks.

B actually blushed faintly and turned around.

Taiyo seemed completely unphased, "he's not my boy friend!" She said, smiling and waving at the couple, who blanched.

B's blush only intensified.

For a few minutes, they both sat in silence as Taiyo ate her crepes. Then Taiyo noticed something, "oh, hey, B, aren't you going to eat anything? You haven't eaten anything in about a day as well!

"I do not require as much food as you seem to. And besides, I only eat sweets."

Taiyo shook her head firmly, getting mother duckly on B again. "You need to eat something. I know! My crepes are sweet, we can share them!" Taiyo smiled and took another bite of crepe.

At this point, B simply had to ask, it was getting to be too much.

"Taiyo? May I ask a question?"

Taiyo looked up and nodded, mouth full of crepe.

"Why aren't you scared of me? And you even behave nicely towards me. Why?"

Taiyo started giggling, then stopped when she thought bits of crepe might come out her nose.

"Ok… so… I'm not scared because there isn't any reason to be. At least, not yet that is. And I'm very good at taking care of myself, so even if you tried to make good on your threat, well, I guess its not really a threat, but whatever, even if you tried to make good on it, I know you wont have an easy time of it." Taiyo calmly paused and took another bite of crepe. "And I'm being nice to you for a lot of reasons; one, I think that it's the best thing to do, being mean isn't going to get me anywhere. Two, being nice might actually get me somewhere. Three, you aren't evil. You're just… misled, by yourself, I think, mainly." Taiyo finished explaining and started eating again.

This time, despite having thought that he'd gotten used to Taiyo scaring him, B yet again found himself completely floundering. He didn't even blink, or have his mouth drop open, he just perfectly still, trying to make sense of what Taiyo had just said.

"What do you mean 'mislead'?" he hissed.

"Well, think of it this way, B. you've spent your entire life thinking that you needed to surpass L. so you've always only thought about him. You've probably thought of yourself as just a copy of L, but one that was really better. So you've never thought about yourself as an individual. You should try it sometime, trying to be yourself rather than simply living to be better than someone else. Then… you're, well you're not really living your own life. You're living theirs."

B again felt himself unable to speak. What Taiyo had just said, was something he had never considered before. He hadn't ever thought of himself as his own person, just as a copy of L. 'could she be right? Could I be simply living L's life? Or trying to?' B wondered.

B sat there, across from Taiyo, feeling rather lost, for one of the first times in his life, he wasn't sure that he was right.

When Taiyo had finished the savory crepe, she proffered one of the two only partially eaten ice creams to B.

"its ok, I don't mind sharing it. And plus, _you need to eat!_" Taiyo said, rather frightenly, when B didn't immediately reach out for it.

B rather hesitantly took the crepe from and took a bite. He was surprised; it was rather good.

B continued eating and Taiyo smiled while she watched. She liked seeing B like this, she felt like he could, as she put it in her head, 'come back' if she kept up showing him what life could be like when you had people around who cared about you.

When they had both finished eating, Taiyo stood up again. B stood up to, for fear of arm removal.

"So, what now!" asked Taiyo happily, dancing around in place.

"We should go back", B said.

Taiyo pulled the best puppy face that B had ever seen, "please can we stay out for a bit? _Please!!" _

B looked at the face Taiyo was making, it was (even to him) unbelievably cute, he couldn't deny that he really wanted to let Taiyo stay out longer.

"Alright, fine", he said, still a bit grudgingly.

"Yeah!!"

Taiyo again set off through the crowds, slipping between people and heading very purposefully away from the street.

After about five minutes of following her, B began to wonder where they were going.

"Taiyo? Where are we going?" he finally asked.

"that way!" replied Taiyo, pointing ahead.

"I am aware of that. I was asking, what is our destination?"

"I have no idea. I'm just going this way because I want to. and I what is the other way."

Taiyo smiled at B and kept walking.

A short while later, the street they were walking on ended, and they emerged into a small park.

The park was quite small, and was enclosed by a high-gate, which ran all the way around the park, and except for one other opening in the gate across from B and Taiyo, the way through which they came was the only way in.

The park itself was truly tiny, and seemed to be quite unknown, as there were very few people in it. The park had small, black-metal benches strewn about it, a few of which had people sitting on them. All this would have been fine, except that almost all of the people sitting on the benches were making out.

Taiyo looked about the teeny park and a look of glee seemed to spread over her face. "Cute!!" she squealed, bounding forward and dragging B reluctantly behind her. All of the snogging couples seemed to have no effect on her.

Taiyo plopped down on a bench and pulled B onto it as well. Taiyo climbed up onto the bench and sat in her strange way on it, at almost the exact same moment as B clambered up next to her.

Taiyo drummed her fingers on her knees to some unheard rhythm and looked about herself, smiling.

B simply stared, he had no idea how to react to the situation, so he comprised by trying hard not to look at Taiyo.

One of couples (the one seated on the bench opposite theirs) seemed to have noticed the new arrival. The broke apart, and seemed to turn as one, watching Taiyo and B, almost… expectantly.

Taiyo sat in the same position, turning her head to look about her, but apart from that, not moving at all.

B too, was holding very still, he was feeling increasingly uncomfortable by the moment, he wished Taiyo would want to leave, but he realized she would want an explanation, and he certainly didn't want to tell her that he felt extremely awkward sitting next to her while surrounded by kissing couples.

When Taiyo and B showed no signs of fawning over each other, the couple across from them seemed to give up and return to what they had been doing before.

B resisted the urge to breathe a sigh of relief.

B felt a tug on his arm. "Look Gemi!" Taiyo was pointing to a tree, "lookies! Cute, isn't it?" B looked hard at the tree, a tall, green leafed maple, as were all the other trees in the park. But try as he might, it wasn't cute. B glanced confusedly at Taiyo, who realized what he was missing, and pointed again.

"Not the tree, the squirrel, in the tree!"

B looked again, and this time, he did see it. A small, grey and brown ball, nestled on a branch, nibbling contentedly on some sort of nut. Its' cheeks were very round, and its big (for its head size) black eyes twinkled. B was surprised that he did, in fact, find it cute. Before then, he had never paid attention to squirrels.

"As a matter of fact, it is rather cute." He told Taiyo, somewhat solemnly, gesturing at the squirrel.

Taiyo's blue eyes widened once B had turned his head away again. 'This is interesting.' She thought to herself.

Taiyo sighed out loud, "are you ready to go, Gemi?"

"Yes", B answered, just slightly too quickly, which Taiyo noticed, but didn't comment on.

"Well, lets go then!" Taiyo launched herself off the bench, then waited while B clambered down a bit more slowly.

Taiyo took off through the opening in the gate on the other side of the park where they had first entered.

B thought about insisting that they head back to his abandoned ware house immediately, but for some reason, decided not to.

The street they now found themselves on was quite different from the alley with food stalls that they had first started at.

This street was lined with pubs, clubs, bars, and other sorts of establishments that all appeared to be the type that would never appear in a tourist map, these were the kinds of places that Taiyo referred to as 'brain blenders'. Although it was only about 6 P.M., there were already quite drunk looking men staggering slightly in front of the pubs.

"hmmm…" Taiyo muttered, "well, this looks like an interesting part of town! Let us explore, Gemi!" Taiyo trotted off down the street, B following behind, very much not sure that he wanted to be here.

Taiyo crossed the street so she could peer in bar windows, B didn't have the faintest idea why she was so curious, but apparently she was. Taiyo watched a T.V. for a few minutes, it was showing nothing more interesting than a college foot ball game, but Taiyo seemed captivated.

Taiyo eventually moved on, continuing to follow the same street, even as the neighborhood obviously worsened.

B finally started to get worried, he reached forward and tugged on Taiyo's shirtsleeve. "Taiyo, I think we should go back now, this is not a safe place to be."

Taiyo looked slightly incredulous, "Gemi, you're a wanted, well, not wanted, they don't have the first piece against you, but a serial killer! And you're worried about being a slightly dodgy neighborhood?"

B looked at the ground, "I reply on my mind to assist me with the murders, I do not have especially superior physical strength." For some reason, B felt very unhappy about using the word "murder" when talking to Taiyo, or more specifically, he really hated talking about his crimes. It made him feel dirty, although he had never had that same sensation before.

"Oh…" Taiyo nodded understandingly, "ok, lets go then." She turned around and started to walk back from where they had come.

She had only gone a few steps when a large, burly and quite foul smelly man stepped out of a small alley in front of her and stood, blocking their path.

"Well hello little missy", he crooned. Taiyo could smell alcohol on his breath, but because of the state of his teeth, she wasn't sure if that was because he had recently been drinking, or if it was a permanent thing.

"where you headed?" he leered again.

Taiyo took a reflexive step backwards, towards B.

The man took a step forwards, still leering down at Taiyo.

"you're really cute", he told her, "why the hell are you hanging around _that_." He jerked his thumb at B.

"please leave us alone." Taiyo said, extremely calmly, looking the man in the eye.

"I don't think I wanna", he replied, taking another step towards Taiyo.

Taiyo held up one finger, the man's face fell into a look of bewilderment. "would you give us just one teeny moment?" Taiyo asked sweetly but firmly.

The man looked confused, and didn't respond, Taiyo seemed to take it for a yes, because she turned to B, although she continued to keep one eye on the man.

"Gemi," she whispered, "what's the plan?"

B blinked. "Plan?" he whispered back.

"Yup, plan. Do you want me to just go ahead and deal with him?"

B felt a strange sensation wash over him; when he finally realized what it was, he was extremely shocked. It was _protectiveness_. He didn't want Taiyo hurt by the large man, who happened to be currently blinking stupidly at both of them.

B tried to comprehend quickly why he would feel protective of Taiyo, when no answer came immediately, he gave up and turned his attention back to the rather more pressing matter.

"Taiyo, I do not think that you could defeat him in hand-to-hand combat."

Taiyo giggled, then a devilish twinkle appeared in her eyes, "watch this." She said to B, before walking forwards again. She looked the man straight in the eye, smiled slightly, and batted her long eye lashes.

A stupid grin broke over the man's face. "Knew you'd come round 'ventually." He said, walking forward until he was standing very close in front of Taiyo, who attempted not to wrinkle her nose, acting was everything.

The man reached around Taiyo to try and grope her. Taiyo waited until the exact right moment, then her knee connected hard with the man's groin. Just as he was staggering backwards, Taiyo's fist was there, connecting hard with his stomach. The man doubled over, trying to catch his breath, when Taiyo's final blow connected with the back of his skull. The man's eyes glazed over, his mouth smiled faintly, and he slumped forward onto the sidewalk. Taiyo then went and felt through his jacket pockets, and finding what she was looking for – a bottle of strong liquor – she wrapped it in her jacket sleeve and picked it up. She then poured the contents carefully down the drain to the sewer, before putting the bottle into the man's open hand. Taiyo then removed the man's wallet, still being extremely careful not to touch anything except the wallet, and put the wallet in her own coat pocket. Taiyo put on the finishing touch by using her toe to mess up the man's jacket so it was slightly out of place. She carefully for any DNA they could have left, then she dusted off her hands, stood up, and started walking again.

There was no one in sight, but never the less, Taiyo walked quickly, not wanting to be seen any where near the now unconscious-would-be-Taiyo-molester.

B was trailing behind Taiyo as usual, however this time; his eyes were wide with a combination of fear, admiration, and something even close to awe.

"Taiyo…?" he said, quite hesitantly.

"What's up, Gemi?" Taiyo chirped, turning around to face him and making a very Lolita face.

B suddenly wondered if he had simply imagined the nearly evil gleam in her eyes. She now looked so cute and innocent; it was hard to believe that this was the same girl who had just very soundly beaten up a drunk pervert.

"Gemi?" Taiyo repeated when B didn't answer.

"Taiyo, back there, what did you do?"

Taiyo gave him a confused and still very innocent look. "isn't it obvious… he…" Taiyo made a serious of hand gestures indicating butt-grabbing-attempts, "and I…" Taiyo demonstrated a series of martial art moves. "that's about it!" Taiyo stuck her tongue out at B and giggled.

"I did not mean that. I meant how you removed his wallet and placed the empty alcohol bottle in his hand. Why did you do that?"

"Oh that! C'mon Gemi… you spend half of your time dodging cops!" Taiyo dramatically sighed and shook her head. "Ok, so, I emptied the alcohol bottle and put it in his hand to make it look like he fainted from an over-dose. Then… the way I hit him and the wallet missing make it like someone attacked him when he was out cold, or very unaware, and then they took his wallet."

Taiyo paused for a moment when B opened his mouth to interrupt, but started talking again before he could say anything. "I know what you're going to point out. 1. His blood alcohol level won't be high enough to cause him to pass out, or even become very disoriented. And 2, he could always just tell any police that it was some girl." Taiyo chortled when B closed his mouth in a defeated sort of way.

"The answer to the first one is, by the time anyone bothers to tell the police, or he wakes up, his blood would have returned to normal anyways. The answer to the second could be any of three options, option one, I hit him hard enough that he won't remember a thing, two, the police will think he was drunk and imagined it. And three, the police could think he's lying for some reason…" Taiyo shrugged, "I mean, I don't really know, those are just most likely. Either way, I wont ever be suspected!"

Taiyo did a happy dance and grinned at B, who was looking at her with a barrage of strange emotions on his face.

B was privately thinking that the police should be very, very glad that Taiyo was (normally at least) on the right side of the law, she could be as hard as him to track down if she ever committed a serious crime. B then wondered if she ever had.

It was truly beginning to get dark as B and Taiyo finally got back to the car and climbed in.

They then had the very long drive ahead of them. B started the car and pulled away, he was almost at the interstate (or whatever they call them in Scotland…) when Taiyo asked for the radio to be turned on.

"What station?" B asked.

"Hum!! I don't really mind, what kind of music do you listen to, Gemi?"

"I seldomly listen to music." B replied, matter-of-factly.

There was a loud, strangled scream from B's left (cars are backwards there…), and for the second time that day, B nearly swerved into on-coming traffic in alarm.

"Taiyo! Please don't do that while I am driving! Hostages are not worth very much if they are dead".

Taiyo looked quite hurt, which made B feel slightly bad, which was a feeling he was still getting used to.

"Sorry, B. it just scares me that you said you don't listen to music… you really must try it! Music… music… I don't know how to tell you about music! But its amazing, understatement really, but it is. I will play you some, sometime."

B didn't bother to ask how or when, or why Taiyo was going to play him music, but he was interested that she had dropped his nick-name.

"Anyways", Taiyo went on, "turn it on, I shall station surf."

Taiyo fiddled with the controls until she found some music she seemed to like, it was a duet between a male and female singer. Taiyo tapped her toe in time to the slow rhythm.

When the chorus came, she sang along with it, her rather pretty voice mixing in with the music.

"_Because I'm broken, when I'm open, and I don't feel like, I am strong enough. Because I'm broken, when I'm lonesome, and I don't feel right, when you've gone away."_

Taiyo seemed to listen very thoughtfully to the rest of the song, occasionally singing along with it, but mostly just listening, and certainly being the quietest that B had ever seen her. She actually looked a bit sad as she nodded her head in time to the song, and B could have sworn – as snuck side-ways glances at her – that she was blinking a bit more often than was normally necessary.

A different song came on after the first was over, this one sung by a female singer with a very beautiful voice.

Taiyo seemed to know this song as well, because she started singing along almost immediately.

When the chorus, it caught B's ear and he listened closely.

"_Don't tear me down, for all I need. Make my heart a better place, give me something I can believe. Don't tear me down, you've opened the door, don't let it close."_

B's breath hitched in his throat, something about those lyrics truly hit home. There was something about Taiyo that had changed him. Not in anyway that he could have explained to anyone, or even himself, but it had changed him, B was sure of it. B wondered faintly if the change was permanent, and then if he wished it was.

When the second song was over, Taiyo changed the radio station, for some reason, looking a bit upset.

It landed on a completely different kind of music, this was peppy and bouncy, and it caused Taiyo's face to crack into a grin, even B thought there was still something in her eyes that normally wasn't there.

Taiyo settled back in her seat and closed her eyes, but continued taping a finger in time to the music. Eventually, the finger slowed, then stopped, and finally, her head tilted sideways. As it fell sideways, it landed on B's shoulder. B was about to open his mouth to wake her up, then stopped. He didn't see any reason to wake her up… B suddenly realized that he had forgotten all about putting Taiyo's blindfold back on. 'I could allow her to continue sleeping, that way I would not have to put it on.'

B nodded to himself, deciding that allow Taiyo to continue sleeping made most sense.

He took his left hand off the steering wheel so Taiyo could lie more comfortably on it.

Taiyo shifted her and nuzzled into B's arm slightly. B smiled faintly and continued driving, leaving the radio on.

--

L paced very impatiently about his hotel room. He had been waiting for it to become dark enough out that he would be able to see the stars, and therefore, Aquila. (The eagle, for you forgetful people… KIDDING! )

He stopped and looked out of the window for the 3rd time that minute. He could see the first stars just beginning to peep out.

L drummed his fingers on the window ledge, it was not like to feel impatient, but he certainly was now. He was also feeling another unusual emotion, anger. He was seething mad at B. Normally; even the most cruel and sadistic murders barely stirred any emotion in him. But right now, he wanted nothing more than to "engage in a 'physical altercation'", with B. "Watari!" L called, unable to stand waiting anymore.

Watari appeared behind L, "you called?" he asked.

"Yes, Watari, please go and get the ready, we leave immediately."

"L, forgive me, but it is not properly dark out yet."

"Yes. I am aware, but as we do know the approximate direction, we can travel east, then hone in on Taiyo as the stars become more visible."

Watari nodded and left the room. L went back to his pacing while he waited.

Watari finally appeared behind L again and motioned to him to come downstairs.

_Hi everybody!! I want to first apologize for the disgustingly huge wait! I hope I made up for it with this chapi, which I'm rather proud of actually! _

_I actually have a question for everyone; can any of my loyal readers draw well? I was wondering if anyone could draw me a picture of the first time L and Taiyo kissed. I hate asking for stuff like this… but if anyone feels UBER generous I would love it!! Review or PM me if you would consider trying… I would of course try to find something nice to do in return… _

_I also wanted to make a stupid announcement; I listened to Lollipop for the 200__th__ time while writing this chapi! I'm going to drop a hint that theres going to be a bit of a shock in next chapi, which could a bit angstly, don't know yet…. –ho hum…– well, I think that's everything! I have pretty much run out of ways to beg/threaten for reviews, so just please do!! Thank you guys so much!! :D _

_Woops! One other thing, this is my longest chapi yet! EXACTLY 13 pages in word!_

–_cheers-_


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 1

Chapter 14

_Soooo… I've had some extra time on my hands, so I'm already writing again. Anyways, I'm going to repeat my begging for reviews!! They really are the only thing keeping me writing, or actually uploading… I think I mentioned that I did not originally even plan on uploading this story… a friend bullied me into it! :P so review please! And it makes me soooo HAPPPY!! Here goes. Oh, and my apologies, this wont be a long chapi. _

L opened the car door and climbed in. Watari started the car and they drove off.

L kept his eyes glued to the sky as they followed the in-built compass East. More and more stars were becoming visible now, and L finally saw the brightest star of Aquila, Altair, finally twinkled into view.

L pointed at it quickly, "go that way, Watari," he instructed.

Watari responded by twiddling the steering wheel and turning onto a new road.

L restlessly shifted in his seat, scanning the road they were on. When they had left the hotel, they had headed as due east as possible, which had put them onto a medium sized road, but when L had spotted Altair, they had turned onto a much, much smaller road, who's direction was a bit more precise.

L and Watari were lucky; they happened to be taking the road that B had in fact used to reach his warehouse.

They drove on in near silence for almost an hour. L kept his eyes on Aquila, and he occasionally pointed or muttered when he thought that Watari should turn.

After about 90 minutes total of driving, they came to a fork in the road. L looked up, Aquila lead down the center, where there was no path. L sighed, and stuck his thumb in between his lips. "Which direction do you believe is more probable?" he asked Watari.

Watari looked about carefully, there were no road signs, no tracks, nothing in slightest, which could indicate which direction B, and Taiyo were in.

Watari finally pointed to the fork, which lead south-east, or the one on the right.

"Why do you believe it is that way?" L asked.

"I do not. But since we have a 50 probability either way, I believe we should simply follow one road, and if it does appear to be correct, we can turn back."

L nodded, feeling too jittery to argue. He chewed harder on his thumb, leaving small red marks.

(A.N. no L!! don't hurt your precious skin!! Oh wait, I wrote that. Now I hate myself!!)

Watari drove forwards, then turned slightly to the left and proceeded down the even road. L began to feel a little concerned, B was certainly keeping Taiyo in a very remote place.

They went on for another 15 minutes before the road they were on changed again. To be more precise, it simply ended. Watari seemed to remain perfectly calm at this new turn of events, but L had a harder time controlling his temper. He had never been terribly rash or impulsive, but he could be (self-proclaimedly) "childish", and Watari knew a tantrum was coming.

"Watari! I want cake!" L said loudly. Watari smiled faintly, he had asked L before they left if he should pack any, but L had said he wouldn't want it. Now L was sitting hunched up, arms crossed and a pouty expression on his face, looking at Watari as though it was fault that the car contained no cake.

"what about Taiyo?" Watari asked softly, peering at L from over his glasses.

L's arms relaxed slightly, and he sat a bit straighter. "what about her?" he asked.

"Wouldn't you rather see her than eat cake?"

"Well, I suppose so. Alright, we will get cake as soon as we can rescue her."

L wouldn't admit it, but as soon as he had thought of Taiyo, all thoughts of cake had practically vanished.

Watari turned the car around headed back the way that they had come.

When they got back to the fork in the road, they took the path that lead north-east instead.

This road behaved quite differently from the right-hand one. Soon after L and Watari had begun driving down it, it joined with a much larger road, which in turn merged with another interstate.

L glanced up at the sky, Aquila was directly over-head, appearing to be flying along with them.

They drove for about 15 minutes before L spotted something.

"Watari! Turn here!" he pointed to an old, rusted sign pointing to an apparently forgotten turn off. The sign read _McSweeny Family-Factory Compound. _Watari quickly turned off of the interstate and followed the new road. It didn't look like anyone had been down it for many years, the concrete was cracked, there were weeds everywhere, and in places tree limbs had fallen into the road.

L stared fixedly ahead into the near darkness. His night vision was decent, but not that great, and with a complete absence of artificial light, he could only see about 10 feet in front of the car.

He was there fore a bit surprised when the car suddenly emerged into a large, open area, which seemed to contain many buildings, most of which appeared to be warehouses.

Watari slowed, but before he had fully stopped, L flung open his door and jumped out of the still moving car.

"L!" Watari called after him, but L paid no attention. He scanned all the buildings look for a sign of occupied-ness. A sign (literally) was not to spot. In fact, there was a large banner hanging over the door of the nearest warehouse.

It had a black background, and painted on top of that in red paint, the banner read. "_CONGRATULATIONS L". _

L stopped running, feeling something welling up in the pit of his stomach. It was like the feeling he had experienced on his 13th birthday, when he actually succeeded in eating too much cake and sweets.

L's hands trembled slightly, although when he realized this, he couldn't fathom why they were, and he began walking slowly towards the building.

L took a deep breath before he opened the door. He grasped the rusty old handle and pulled. The door slid open with a loud squealing sound.

L gasped at what he saw inside.

The room was completely empty. All that the rusty building contained was two pieces of

Paper, sitting innocently in the middle of the floor.

L checked for a possible trap, when it was clear there weren't any, he gulped slightly, then walked into the room and picked up the pieces of paper.

He choked slightly at what the first paper had on it. There was hand writing almost identical to his own, but with a sort of harshness to the writing.

L read the first paper.

_As my banner says, congratulations L. you have succeeded in solving the first riddle. yes, the first. I am sorry, but you may not have Taiyo back with so much ease. _

_I have changed our location, and I will do so once more after this. Although I cannot allow you communication with her, I assure you that Taiyo is perfectly healthy and safe. _

_The next clue will not be as easy, however, I was sincere when I said that I would kill Taiyo if you do not solve it. _

_B_

L dropped the first paper to the floor, feeling the sick feeling rise in his stomach. He read the second paper, and the feeling intensified.

_Cross the tempestuous sea to a place where not even trees can survive the elements. _

_Barren, desolated, yet so old and alive. _

_Embrace the ground as they once did, hear the Earth pulse, hear her voice. _

This paper to fell to the floor as L's knees also gave way. He looked down at the paper again, feeling the hopelessness surge into his throat. He didn't think he had even the faintest chance of solving it, and he was feeling scared. Scared that he wouldn't be able to, and that B would kill Taiyo. It was a strange feeling to L, but he couldn't imagine how he would feel if Taiyo was killed because of him.

--

Taiyo felt herself placed on something soft and warm. She slowly opened her eyes, rubbed them and gazed sleepily around her. Her first thought was that she was back home. But then she took in the drab, plain and unoriginal wall decorations and realized that this was certainly not the case.

"Good morning Taiyo." A voice said from behind her, which was accompanied by a clinking sound.

Taiyo woke up a bit more and looked behind her, B was standing behind her, or more precisely, behind the couch that he had put her on.

"This… isn't…warehouse…" Taiyo mumbled, still very sleepily.

"It is indeed not." B said, sounding cheerful. "I was myself beginning to find it unpleasant to be there, so I decided to move you sooner than I had originally intended to. This is a hotel room."

"Oh." Taiyo shifted so she was sitting cross-legged on the couch.

B moved around the couch and climbed up next to her. "We will be moving again in the morning, so I would suggest that you sleep while you can. We will be rising before 5."

"That's fine with me… I usually get up early, anyways…" Taiyo yawned yet again, she may wake up early, but it took her forever to wake up, especially if she didn't have anything to be excited about. An event that very rarely happened.

Taiyo got up and climbed over the back of the couch, she seemed oblivious of dragging B behind her. (A.N. yes, they are _still _handcuffed…)

Taiyo stopped, having finally noticed a certain problem with the room.

"Gemi", said Taiyo, pointing, "there's only one bed."

B nodded, seeming unaware of the implications. "Since we are hand-cuffed, we would not be able to sleep on two separate beds, the chain would not reach."

Taiyo nodded, not seeming to care much either. "just stay on your own side of the bed. Ill try to stay on mine to, but I have an unconscious habit of cuddling up to people while I sleep. If I start pushing you off the bed, wake me up… just to warn you…"

"… Alright." B wasn't quite sure what to say, the thought of Taiyo snuggled against him brought up troubling feelings for him.

"Pajamas?"

It took B a moment to catch on, then he realized that Taiyo was asking for a pair. B led Taiyo to a closet and pulled out a set.

Taiyo gave the pink daises an annoyed look, then turned towards the bath room. When she reached the end of the chain, she back around and looked expectantly at B.

B realized what she meant, and unlocked their handcuffs.

"Thanks", Taiyo muttered, as she moved into the bathroom. She came out a moment later, changed, and still yawning.

Taiyo began shuffling towards the bed, before her face suddenly light up with apparent joy.

"Hot-water-bottle!" Taiyo said loudly, skipping slightly.

B suddenly remembered that that was the last thing Taiyo had complained of before falling asleep. "Oh," he said, "I had forgotten your fondness for them. I will get one."

"Yeah! Thank you!" Taiyo smiled at him, B felt his stomach contract.

B went into the bathroom, got a hot water bottle, filled it and then came back and put it under the covers on the side that Taiyo seemed to have claimed by sitting on.

B then went to "his side" and sat on it as well.

Taiyo held out her wrist, looking at B with an expectant look again.

B suddenly remembered that he had forgotten to put the handcuffs back on. He put the other side over Taiyo's wrist and clicked it into place.

When Taiyo and B were once more chained up, Taiyo crawled under the covers and lay with her back facing B.

B looked at the back of her head for a moment before also lying down.

"Jus' don' get any ideas…" Taiyo mumbled into her pillow.

B sat up quickly, a look of utter horror on his face. "Taiyo! I would never even conceive of taking advantage of you like that!"

"I know", Taiyo mumbled back.

B's face changed from a look of horror to its not accustomed expression of confusion. "How do you know that?" he asked.

"'Cause, Ryu- L would never do that. You should have seen him, he's actually pretty old-fashioned about girls… anyways, good night."

"Good night". B lay back down, this time facing towards Taiyo, and looked at her hair, which was catching light from in between the blinds. "its pretty…" B thought just as he drifted off to sleep.

_I'm UBER sorry!! I realized at some point that I was going to need to drag this arc out just a tad. But I do promise that Taiyo and L will be reunited as soon as possible! If anyone has any ideas about how that can happen faster, please tell me, I'm very frustrated with this arc, and want to end it as quickly as possible. Actually, if anyone has any ideas in general, please share, I need some ideas for chapi 15. Anyways, please let me know any thoughts, comments or advice (or random screaming) that you have about this chapi!! Thanks muches! Oh yes, does anyone have any ideas for Taiyo's real name? I'm fresh out… and I've spent months thinking about it. I want it to be something kind of worldly, with some kind of connection to ancient mythology. It does not need to start with T! sorry for rambling… woops! One more apology! I'm sorry if there's too much detail in the second section… _

_L's Lollipop_


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 1

_Hi!!! ^^ thanks to the sweet people who are actually taking the time to review! Come on people! Reviewing takes you less than a minute, and makes me squeal with joy for hours!!! –uber-cute-Taiyo-like-face- please? Anyways, heres chapi 15! I hope it ends up long… _

The lake shown and glittered beautifully in the moon-light. Taiyo sighed with happiness as she sat down on the bank and trailed a hand through the silver water. She inhaled again and smelled that certain smell that always made her feel so at home. The smell was salty, but so fresh and pure. It smelled like everything that Taiyo loved.

It was the smell of the ocean.

Taiyo breathed it in once more, her eyes closed.

Then L was sitting next to her. Taiyo leaned towards him and he wrapped his arms around her. Taiyo leaned closer, trying to be as close to him as she could. She looked into face, into his eyes. They both leaned closer together, and then their lips met. Taiyo felt so warm, so safe. To her, it felt that kissing him was so… right. Like it was entirely meant to happen. It felt perfect. Taiyo felt like she was melting, falling into a fuzzy blackness, so warm, so soft, so peaceful, and then…

For the second time, Taiyo was awoken in the small hours of the morning by a fearful moan.

Taiyo's eyes snapped open and she turned to look at B. he was acting exactly the same as the first time last night.

He was waving his arms about and seemed to be trying to escape from something that was chasing him, or holding him down.

"Stop!" he groaned, "leave me alone… go away! No! Don't touch me, don't hurt me! Noooo!" B screamed, really screamed a high-pitched and terrorized cry, as though something or someone had burned him.

B lay still for a moment, and then in a voice like a frightened child's, he shrieked, "Please don't! No! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Please stop it!"

Taiyo sat up very quickly; she scooted over to B, then lay back down and wrapped both arms around his middle.

B trashed around wildly for a few seconds more, then quieted down. Taiyo shut her eyes again, but she almost immediately felt hands around her neck.

She didn't start, but fairly calmly opened her eyes and looked into B's red ones, which were right in her face.

Inwardly sighing, Taiyo raised an eyebrow at B, being unable to speak.

"What are you doing?" B hissed, not releasing his grip on Taiyo's neck.

Taiyo made a choking expression, and B seemed to realize what he was doing. He quickly let go of Taiyo with an apologetic expression.

"I'm sorry…" he muttered.

"Its ok", Taiyo faintly wheezed, still not letting go of B.

"Why are you…" B trailed off, avoiding Taiyo's eyes.

"Because." Taiyo said matter-of-factly, "You were having _that _nightmare again."

B glared like a child who someone was refusing to tell where the easter basket was hidden. "how do you know what I was dreaming?" he asked.

"just can!" Taiyo told him cheerfully, as she started rubbing one hand up and down his back.

B tried to squirm away, but Taiyo held on tightly.

"you have to tell me before I let go you!" and besides, why _are _you so determined not to let me give you a hug? You're upset, most people like hugs, especially when they're upset."

"because!" B half shouted, still squirming, "I do not allow myself to have emotions, or be upset, certainly not by something that exists only in my mind and does not even have physical substance!"

"No emotions?" Taiyo asked, B couldn't see her face, but he could hear the sarcasm in her voice. "Gemi," she said kindly, "you've already lost that battle. And it's a very good thing you did. It's an awful life, living without feelings. Not something that I would wish on anyone."

B felt like he couldn't stand it anymore, a part of him, and a part that was growing rapidly, a part that he had tried his absolute best to suppress, wanted desperately to tell Taiyo what was hurting inside of him so badly, to finally try and find comfort for the pain that he had lived with all his life. But the part of him that didn't yet want to tell Taiyo somehow managed to win out yet again.

B put all his strength into one final escape effort and this time, succeeded. B quickly squirmed away from Taiyo, further towards his edge of the bed until he was nearly falling off of it. Taiyo didn't move at all. She was sitting quietly, looking out of the window. The moon was visible beyond the glass, three-quarters full.

An uncomfortable silence fell, which was finally broken by Taiyo humming softly. B didn't recognize the song, but despite his general non-interest in music, the song sounded very pretty to him.

After a while, Taiyo seemed to get sleepy again and she slipped back under the blankets before curling up into a small ball.

B watched her again. The part of him that really wanted to confide in her was growing steadily. B squeezed his eyes shut and tried to go back to sleep as well. Just before B fell completely asleep, he checked his watch, it was 3:30 a.m. B yawned and closed his eyes.

--

the next thing B felt was something quite large, and quite warm, as well as being cuddly and soft. B opened his eyes, feeling a bit alarmed, the thing snuggling him was… Taiyo.

Taiyo was curled up in her same ball, and was snuggled up against B's chest, with a happily contented smile on her face. She seemed completely oblivious to what she was doing.

B, despite the fact that he felt like he was turning into a Taiyo-pillow, once again felt compelled not to wake her up. In fact, he found (to his consternation) that he quite liked having her snuggled up against him. It _was _warm. But there was something else, some feeling that B wasn't used to, but liked. B finally realized what it was, he had been so deprived of human contact, growing up in the cold and sterile world of Wammy's, that, ever since he had been very young, he had been completely deprived of human contact. In the same moment, B realized that being touched by another person in a nice way, was more comforting that he could have imagined. Being extremely careful not to wake her up, B let one arm slide over and rest on her back. Then he closed his eyes once more.

When she was absolutely sure he was asleep, Taiyo carefully opened one eye. She looked up at B, and although she couldn't really see his face, since he was now resting his chin on top of her head, Taiyo could tell that it had worked. A quirky smile spread over her face, then she too closed her eyes again.

-_scringe- short… well, I'm sorry that after the more than one month wait, I wrote less than 4 pages, but I do have an excuse, un! I was uber busy with school… -nods- I (as I always say) will try to write more! And, if anyone has any hinky ideas for me, please share, cause I really wanna know what you guys are thinking, eg, if you like where the stories going. Get all your minds out of the gutter, NOW! That's absolutely NOT what I meant, un!!! Please review!!! I'm addicted to them… ^^ _


	16. REWRITE!

Hello everyone! I want to apologize for the uber long for the next chapter to come out. I have not dropped Better Than Cake! however, I've done something very hooky. I've completely started over, and I'm changing a fair amount. I've been planning to write a sequel to BTC for a while, and I 1: didn't like the way the story was going/sounding for a long time, and 2: didn't think it was leading up to the sequel well at all. I've uploaded the first chapter of the rewrite, and would REALLY REALLY REALLY appreciate everyone taking a look and letting me know what you think. If people seem to prefer the original, I'll go back to it. =^^= Many apologies and thanks!

-Ls Lollipop


	17. Chapter 15 and a half

chapter 15.5

hello everybody... -sigh-

its been how many months? dont remind me...

school has been a nightmare, seriously.

so, about this story! i thought about it for a long time, and ive decided to stick with the original, mainly cause ive actually got a lot of other stuff id rather be writing, and i just want to get this story finished up so i can move more officially onto them. but! BTC still has quite a ways to go! so i wont be done anytime soon.

im going to delete the rewrite, sorry to those who preferred it. ^^

ummm ummm ummm....

im having serious writers block about BTC, and i know why, but cant fix it.

ANY HELP WOULD BE AWESOME!!!

Im really really looking for tips or advice, even flames might help me at this point. =P

chapi 16 will be uploaded in a min, it will suck. i know....

hope you guys stick with me!

-Ls Lollipop


	18. Chapter 16

_sorry about the thing with chapter 15 and a half if it showed up in your inboxes as chapter 155. fanfiction can be frustrating. _

_hope this isnt TOO awful!_

_hugs to all my readers! ^^ _

Chapter 16

_Beep beep beep_

"Neeeeeoooooowwww…" Taiyo moaned into her pillow, turning over violently and wrenching the covers over her head to block out the offending sound.

"Ow!"

"I don't wanna wake up, Gemi, lemme go back to sleep. No music… don't wanna wake up… no music…" Taiyo pulled the pillow over her head.

"Taiyo, that hurt quite a bit."

"Wah, huh?"

"When you woke up and turned over, you shoved your elbow forcefully into my stomach."

"ooooh… I'm sorry. Can I go back to sleep?"

"No, I'm sorry, but you may not. As I reminded you last night, we have to wake up early in order to travel to our next destination."

"Oh, right." Taiyo looked uncharacteristically sad, she pulled her knees into her chest and looked out of the window again.

"Taiyo? Is something troubling you? Do you not like planes?"

Taiyo sighed and looked back at B. "no, planes are fine. Its just… distance puts you further from things."

"…" _That_ seemed quite obvious to B.

"it puts you further from things that mean a lot to you. I miss a lot of stuff."

Taiyo smiled wanly at B, "its not like being with you isn't fun", B found himself mentally thumping his head into the head rest, "but… I miss my ratties, and my friends, and I miss Ryu- L." Taiyo smiled in an almost sad way, "when am I going to get used to calling him that."

B had no idea what to say, he couldn't help but feel guilty, but for some reason, he was also feeling very happy with how she had said that it was fun being around him.

"we must begin getting ready now", he finally said.

Taiyo nodded and dragged herself out of bed. "cold…" she muttered.

"Taiyo, I am going to unlock our hand cuffs so we can get ready more quickly."

Taiyo nodded sleepily again.

B unlocked their hand cuffs and Taiyo immediately went to the bath room. B could hear water running, then a few thumps, which sounded oddly like something heavy hitting the wall, then finally the door opened and Taiyo shuffled out, eyes still half lidded with sleep, but dressed.

Taiyo rubbed her head with a pained expression, then rubbed her hip. When she caught B watching her, she sleepily mumbled, "sleepy, crashed into wall. Bad wall…"

B was slightly concerned, but didn't say anything and went into the bath room too. He quickly got dressed, as usual ran a comb through his hair to no avail, then brushed his teeth. He was just turning the door knob to go out when he caught sight of the wall behind him in the mirror. B turned back from the door and glared at the wall. If it hadn't been a wall, it would have been quite terrified by the look B was giving it, but it was a wall, so it didn't respond, and B finally walked out of the bathroom.

He found Taiyo curled up in a tiny ball on the couch. She looked perfectly serene with her arms around wrapped around herself, her knees tucked just below her chin, and a small smile on her face.

B watched her sleeping for a few moments, before he realized what she was doing. Sleeping. B sighed and shook his head, she had said she was O.K. with waking up early, apparently, that wasn't entirely true. B thought for a moment, then, remembering how hard it had been to wake her up last time, he simply picked her up, and brought her down to the car and stowed her in the back seat, before going back to get their stuff.

Taiyo woke up a little after she heard in her sleep the car door close quietly behind her. She sat up and looked at the car. "oh. I musta fell asleep again.." she suddenly realized something, Gemi had left her alone in the car. That fact woke up Taiyo completely, she realized that, if she went right now, she could escape. She couldn't fathom why B had left her alone, if it was a conscious or subconscious decision. But the fact remained that there was nothing to prevent Taiyo from simply leaving. She looked out the car window, B really was no where to be seen. Taiyo figured he was either back in their hotel room getting their things, or that he had for some reason, decided to leave her here.

Taiyo peered out the window for a moment longer, then climbed into the front seat and buckling her seatbelt, smirking to herself.

B came out of the front door of the hotel about 5 minutes later, carrying Taiyo's coat and the few other little things they had with them.

B slouched over the van, opened the truck and placed everything inside, before getting into the drivers seat.

Taiyo watched him closely for a reaction, but B didn't seem surprised that she was still in the car.

Without a word, B started the car and they drove off.

After a few minutes, Taiyo started poking around in the dashboard. She then opened the glovebox and dug around.

B tried very hard to ignore her and keep driving, but couldn't control himself when she unbuckled her seat belt and climbed into the back.

"Taiyo, what are you doing?" he finally asked.

"looking for an iphone charger", she called back from where she was digging through here coat pockets, "I thought I had one".

"what do you need it for?"

"music. Or I will be a zombie for the rest of the day".

"we have a radio".

"I don't want to bother you, and theres a song I really want to listen to."

"alright", B finally agreed, Taiyo didn't seem to want to give up.

Taiyo rooted about in her coat and finally pulled out a long white cord. She climbed back into the front of the car and pulled it into a small outlet that was already plugged into the cigarette lighter.

"where did you get that?" asked B, pointing to the outlet.

"It was already here." Taiyo replied, "I guess whoever you jacked this van from had an iPhone."

"How did you know I stole the van!?" B said loudly.

Taiyo gave him a withering look. "I thought you knew me better. I assume the plates are new though right?"

B nodded slowly.

Taiyo plugged the ear phones she also had in her hand into her now charging phone and after a moment her head began nodding in time to a rhythm that B couldn't hear.

B drove on in silence, but only for about 30 seconds, an ear phone popped off of Taiyo's ear that was closer to B.

"Gemi," she said, already sounding a good deal more awake, "how much longer?"

"Why do you want to know?" B replied.

"Well geeeez, I'm just asking!" Taiyo said, sticking her tongue out at B.

"If I told you", B went on, "it might help you to determine our location."

Taiyo rolled her eyes, "I really don't seem very inclined to run away though, do I?"

B considered this, it was quite true after all. Since he had kidnapped her, Taiyo had not made even a single bid for freedom. B had even tested her this morning, when he'd left her in the car, he had set up a device which would alert him if Taiyo had tried to open a door, as well as lock the door immediately. Taiyo had actually waited for him to come back.

But B was still suspicious, he knew how smart Taiyo was, and was sure she was plotting something by not running, or at least not running yet. It was actually very irritating to B that he couldn't determine her motives.

The road the van was driving down was a rather large road, not quite big enough to a freeway, but which was clearly intended for people driving long distances at high speeds. At the moment they were driving through a woody-almost country like region, fairly remote, but still with a fair number of cars on the road.

"I believe we will be there in about 10 minutes", B said after mulling it over. He had realized that there was a possibility that Taiyo would recognize the air port they were heading to anyway, and as long as he kept a close eye on her, it wouldn't help her escape regardless. 'perhaps I should take her phone for a while,' he thought, 'she could be sending someone our coordinates.'

B suddenly realized something, something which could make all his plans fail if he was right. quickly swerving over to the shoulder of the road, he stopped the car and was about to grab for Taiyo's phone when he checked himself, there wasn't any need to be rude. Instead he pulled off Taiyo's head phones.

Taiyo looked at him curiously, "what is it?" she asked.

"Give me your phone," he said.

Taiyo's eyes narrowed.

"May I please borrow your phone?" B tried again, then wondered why he had, but stopped that train of thought, there were more important things.

Taiyo looked happier and handed him her phone, which B took and began examining it.

He didn't have one himself, they were much too easy to trace, but he quickly figured out how to work it. Sure enough, it was just as he'd feared, Taiyo's phone had a GPS locator in it that would allow her to find their location anywhere on the globe.

For a moment, B panicked, he was sure that Taiyo must have only been listening to music under the pretense of finding out where they were. He studied the tiny map more closely, and breathed a sigh of relief, the map was still showing a location in Edinburgh, apparently a search for donuts.

B's thoughts raced, was it possible that Taiyo had set this up? Something else occurred to B, Taiyo had asked how much longer. She certainly could have done that to try and trick B into thinking that she didn't know, but why bring it up at all? That would only draw B's attention to the fact that she was interested.

B chewed on his thumb in thought, Taiyo watched him curiously, then peered over the screen and saw what he was looking at.

"Oh!" she said, "you think I was finding out where we are, don't you?"

B looked up at her, she didn't appear anxious in the slightest.

"It only just occurred to me", B said, wondering if he should simply ask her, then deciding not too, she was surely a good liar.

"I didn't", she said, smiling, "although I always could be lying," she commented as an after thought, almost as if she knew what B had been thinking.

Taiyo sighed, "don't you trust me yet?", she asked.

B thought it was probably a rhetorical question and ignored it.

But it caused B to think, did he trust Taiyo? A part, and a growing one, might well have. And the evidence continued to glare at him that she wasn't trying to escape, which baffled B so much that he tried not to believe it. Or refused to.

B felt like a cloud was forming inside his brain. A cloud that he couldn't think through or around. A cloud he really, really didn't like, but couldn't, or possibly wouldn't, get rid of, but he had to think about that, and when it came to the cloud, thinking was impossible.

The cloud had a name too, it called itself Taiyo.

And, as seemed to be happening more and more often with the cloud, it got its way, and B handed its phone back to it, still giving it suspicious looks.

"Thanks," said Taiyo, taking her phone back.

B made a noise in the back of his throat and restarted the car.


	19. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

Taiyo went back to her iPhone. She seemed to have turned on music again, but this time she closed her eyes and leaned back, looking completely serene.

B watched her curiously out of the corners of his eyes. He wondered what she was listening to her make her so calm. After a few moments he couldn't contain his curiosity. He poked her. she took off her ear phones and looked at him questioningly.

"I, errr…. I was wondering what you were listening to." he said, realizing it might sound a bit strange.

Taiyo giggled. "oh ok! Here ya go." She plunked the ear phones over his head.

For a few seconds B wasn't sure what had happened, but the noise he heard made him jerk the wheel in surprise. It sounded like a someone being murdered to musical accompaniment. He yanked the head phones back off.

"what was that?!"

"metal!" Taiyo chirped happily, "very good, especially early in the morning, don't you think?"

B cringed.

"I just _love _Hemorrhage," Taiyo babbled on. "I usually use them for my alarm."

B simply couldn't see the appeal.

They had been driving for about 20 minutes by then, and they were on a pretty country road, lined with trees which bordered sections of what might well have been farm land, which after even longer gave way to bogs and moors. They were quite truly in roughly the middle of nowhere.

Taiyo was peering animatedly out the windows, the look of giddy anticipation on her face growing steadily as the scenery grew more and more wild. After a while though, she began looking a little perplexed.

"Gemiiiiii…. Where _are _we going? We is in the middle of nowheres."

"I'm quite sure you're aware that I would have to alert authorities if I were to keep my plane in a public or even private airport. So I've kept it here, where no one will find it."

B explained, and as he did so, he turned off of the road they had been driving on and drove straight out in the marsh. Twice the car nearly got stuck in a particularly boggy patch, and eventually B even needed Taiyo get out a compass to help them navigate.

After they had been driving in the marshy land for almost half an hour, and after they had gone several miles even further into absolutely no mans (or even sheeps) land, a tiny, twin propeller plane came into view over the horizon.

B pulled the van up along side it and got out. Taiyo did too, walking around the plane as much as the hand cuffs permitted and inspecting every inch curiously. This did not help B, who was trying to get their baggage out of the car while getting periodically jerked out by Taiyo.

Finally B got fed up and the next time Taiyo accidentally tugged on him he yanked back, causing Taiyo to nearly over balance and fall down. She fell –splat- onto the car, but bounced up almost immediately and didn't even look angry, and after that trotted after B as he unloaded.

Finally bags and humans (?) were out of the car and into the plane. Taiyo immediately climbed onto the copilots seat and watched as B, seemingly rather reluctantly, sat normally on his seat.

B pushed a few buttons, pulled a few levers, and the propellers began to spin as the plane lifted off.

-sigh- how long has it been? I know its been months. I'm vewwwy sorry. And now such a short chapi. hope it all makes sense, I've forgotten everything. Lemme know if I'm screwed something up, kk? ^^ I've started working, and honestly I've been working on other (and better) stories and ideas for stories.

If anyones still reading this, would you please let me know if you'd like me to keep writing B and Taiyo POV or do a chapi on how our ikkle L is doing?? –bows- thank you all!

LsLollipop


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